What is an intern?

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In regards to interns, the FLSA states that trainees or students are interns – not employees – if they meet all six of the following criteria:

The training, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to that which would be given in a vocational language-school-834138_1920school.
The training is for the benefit of the trainees or students.
The trainees or students do not displace regular employees, but work under their close observation.
The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the trainees or students, and on occasion its operations may actually be impeded.
The trainees or students are not necessarily entitled to a job at the conclusion of the training period.
The employer and the trainees or students understand that the trainees or students are not entitled to wages for the time spent in training.
In short, the intern experience should be educational and beneficial to the students. This benefit should be equitable to the employer and intern. The fourth criterion is particularly problematic for employers. The DOL will ask whether the productive work performed by the interns is offset by the burden to the employer from the training and supervision telegram number list provided. If it is not offset – then the interns will be deemed employees.

SOURCE: US Department of Labor, Interns

Final Thoughts
photographer-410326_1920While it’s still unclear to me just exactly how the Odyssey works out their labor classifications, I think there are things that the Odyssey does well and I think that there’s things they can do better. For one, the Odyssey takes on certain burdens for their contributors. They manage the content management system (CMS), domain, and hosting for contributor content, which for a site of this magnitude cannot be cheap. They are like YouTube, in that they allow people to freely publish in the same way YouTube functions. One thing they do extremely well is marketing. They have tapped into the millennial’s innate desire for purpose, to have a seat at the table when it comes to their ideas, and to have a voice on the world stage. Accumulating over 14,ooo contributors is no small feat for a business, and that is something to be admired.

In terms of things they lack, they do not provide much feedback or educational experience. If they are operating under the guise of an internship, I would expect much more feedback and assistance when it comes to writing articles for them – otherwise they may run into problems with the DOJ.