I think you're doing exactly what you need to be doing. You're doing it...you're actually writing things and getting them published. Everyone has to start somewhere. My first jobs were on a hospital radio station because I talk proper - worst moment: an old dear croaking on me in mid-live interview - and then for a television news agency writing captions on a live telex link for a satellite upload. That was a sink-or-swim situation and a half! If I had screwed up, it would have cost the agency thousands. On my first try-out, they told me it was just a practice run with dummy film. It wasn't...
I was eighteen. I then went off and did other things before drifting back to journalism, which is the last refuge of the unemployable, media and journalism courses at college being the first refuge. Joking aside, speaking seriously now, degrees in media studies and journalism tend to prevent job applicants from even getting an interview with most editors and publishers. Journalism remains one of the few professions in which on-the-job experience wins out over diplomas and degrees every time. Of course, those who run degree courses - and those who wasted three years taking them - will argue otherwise for obvious reasons. In the end, the proof is in the inescapable fact that it's one of those jobs you can either do or can't do.
It sounds as if you have what it takes to do it because, for a start, you've already moved your **** and gotten some of your stuff published. It is just as uncomplicated in 'the real world'. If you have good ideas, an ability to communicate them well in writing, a bit of front - but without being abrasive - and you are reasonably reliable and, importantly, easy to deal with, you'll quickly encounter editors who will publish you. Trust me, finding good, reliable writers to fill up those pages between the ads is one of the biggest problems editors face.
Start offering small pieces to your local newspapers. Anything you think is newsworthy. Build up the basis of a portfolio and then you can look at specialising in fashion writing. You see, when you call up the commissioning editor of some lifestyle or fashion glossy with an idea for, say, a front-of-book filler piece to get things rolling, he/she/it will take you more seriously if you can say that you've been writing stuff for the East Giggleswick Thunderer or the Catsfart Post. If you call up and say "Hi! I have a degree in journalism and media studies and I want to write about fashion stuff for you!" - I've had calls like that - you'll be written off before you have closed your mouth.
What do you do next? Keep getting published. If, in the end, you find that you are more drawn to the fashion editorial and advertising side of things, you could always consider diversifying into what we call "creative services", which encompasses copywriting, translation and editing and other communication tools-related writing-based skills alongside more advanced stuff like, for example, writing advertisements and clips, which is a form of screenwriting. The world, my lad, is your lobster, as Conran (I think) once said. If you do want to do the university thing, read for a degree that has nothing to do with any of this. Choose something useful, in case you come over all vocational later on in life and want to become a psychologist or something.
PK
are you hkness or are u living and working in hk? i am from guangzhou.
