Wild Shares Onion Experiences

A.V. Club Milwaukee Editor and Onion writer Matt Wild gave a talk to the Journalism and Media Studies Living Learning Community at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee on Nov 18th, and told the students to “write about stuff you can have fun with.”

Wild received his Bachelor’s degree in Film at UW-Milwaukee. After graduation in 2002, Wild landed a job writing for Vital Source in 2005. In 2010, Wild began free-lance writing for A.V. Club Milwaukee and it’s sister website, The Onion. Wild soon became and is currently the editor of A.V. Club Milwaukee.

A.V. Club Milwaukee is a website devoted to covering arts, entertainment and city life in Milwaukee. The Onion is a newly “internet only” national news website that mimics real objective hard news stories through satire and sarcasm.

With a degree in Film, Wild said he knew he wanted to become a writer when he “first got paid for writing” for Vital Source.

Wild provided the class with advice and insight on their future at UWM and future career. Wild said, “most internships aren’t worth your time, but writing for free or cheap is worth your time.” Wild followed the statement with, “contact places you want to write for,” because that’s exactly what he did.

Wild attended UWM to keep his band “Holy Mary Motor Club” together. Wild played guitar and sang in the band and they stayed together for 10 years. Wild laid low a few years after graduation but met the editor of Vital Source during an interview of the band and shortly after began writing for Vital Source. A few years after writing for Vital Source, Wild contacted A.V. Club Milwaukee and soon became the editor.

Wild’s advice on landing writing gigs: “live on Twitter, Facebook and always look for anything interesting about bands or news.”

The Journalism, Advertising and Media Studies Living Learning Community requires students to take a Journalism First-Year Seminar. The seminar is instructed by Jessica McBride, a UWM Journalism graduate and teacher at UWM who arranged for Wild to give the talk.

LLC stands for “Living Learning Community” where 20-72 students with a common academic interest live on the same or a close floor and take a minimum of one class together. UWM has 27 different LLC’s within the Residence Halls. An LLC, according to the UWM website, is a “community within a community” that helps freshman students transition into the academic setting of college.

After the talk, student Megan Jay expressed her reaction. “Matt was definitely different from the other speakers we’ve had so far. He didn’t sugar coat anything and I could tell he spoke from experience. Matt really made me think during his talk and left me with some useful advice.”