A friend consulting for a small newspaper chain asked my advice on a copy-editing issue. He noted inconsistency in editing, with many typos and errors in grammar and sentence structure. Copy didn’t follow AP style. “The credibility of the writer and publication can hang on the cleanliness of their copy, even at small papers,” the friend told the company.
His client responded with agreement that the criticism was valid, but asked how to achieve better editing, given the staffing levels. The friend asked my advice. My response (expanded and edited a bit for this blog post):
It’s a tough question. As an old copy editor who has taught grammar workshops and who values clean copy, I agree at a philosophical and sentimental level. The old Des Moines Register was a joy to read with the top-flight copy desk we had back in the day (and that was when & where I was a copy editor).
But as someone working on journalism innovation, I know that costs and value propositions are a critical factor in financial success and even survival. My first newspaper had no copy desk and it was nowhere near as good as the Register, but it was good enough. Our news staff was three reporters and a city editor (plus a retired editor working part-time). I knew the city editor was just going to give my copy a quick glance, so I had to take responsibility for the quality of my copy, and I made it pretty good (but not as good as a copy editor would have).
We have no copy editors at TBD (and got criticized for that after a famous correction). While the newsroom staffing was Editor Erik Wemple’s decision, I fully support it. You can’t do everything, and a digital operation can correct after publication with less damage than a print publication (very few people saw the original error that we were correcting; it was the correction that went viral). Erik gave everyone a writing test in the interview, so we could see their raw copy. You do need to screen for copy quality. If copy editing resources can’t be what they used to be, then maybe you can no longer afford that staff member who’s a good reporter but a mediocre (or even bad) writer. Or even a good writer but a lousy speller. (Or you need to demand that they get better and start compensating for the weaknesses they know they have.)
Anyway, I think in today’s value analysis, clean copy (especially AP style) isn’t as valuable as it used to be (or has been surpassed in value by some other factors). As an editor, I did occasionally field calls from people complaining about grammar and spelling, but never about AP style. When those people told me our proofreaders were doing a lousy job, I told them that newspapers haven’t had proofreaders for decades, which just underscores that technology and value change with time. And newspapers have never employed fact-checkers, an added quality step employed by some magazines. Quality has always been a relative matter, with publications deciding how much they could afford to spend in pursuit of unattainable perfection. I hope the value equation continues to support copy editors at most operations, but that’s a decision individual editors, publishers and group presidents will have to make with their budgets, their value equations and their communities.
OK, that’s the philosophical and big-picture stuff. Here’s a practical question: Has the chain consolidated editing functions? That’s not as good a solution, in terms of quality, as having copy editors at each location. But if an organization doesn’t have or can’t afford quality editing at each location, consolidation might provide better, more efficient editing and design. If I were advising or running a chain now, I would certainly consider and probably encourage centralization of editing and design functions. If they have already done that, I would say that the solutions lie in some combination of better training, better hiring or better analysis of the workflow and responsibilities. For instance, if the same people are doing editing and design, they may hire some people with stronger design skills than editing skills. So they either need to train those designers better in editing, accept a lower quality of editing or reassess the workflow to have editors who are good at editing do all (or most) of the copy editing and designers who are good at designing do all or most of the designing. Maybe it’s a hybrid: the designers do section fronts and feature pages and little or no editing, and the copy editors design some formatted inside pages but most of their work is editing.
Another thing to consider is whether an organization is spending too much time editing wire copy. I know local copy editors add value when they edit wire copy, having done it myself. I also know that wire copy has already been edited by professional copy editors. The local editing can and should be cut back or nearly eliminated. Or certainly wire editing could be consolidated among affiliated newspapers.
The truth is that grammar and editing skills are declining in the population and among journalists. Newspapers are in a difficult spot. Readers are older and learned grammar in a different era when it got greater emphasis (though you’d be amazed how many arrogant, critical letters I received from readers, taking us to task for our errors but containing errors of their own). But many staff members are young people who grew up txting “lol, omg” and the like.
I’ll end with another philosophical note. English is an evolving language. For better or worse, the great copy editing pros of our generation did/do not write/edit like Chaucer, Shakespeare, Dickens, Hemingway or Ginsberg. As I wrote in chastising the New York Times‘ failure to recognize the position of “tweet” in standard English, our language is vibrant and fluid. Newspaper style tends to be slow to recognize genuine change in the language, so I’m not going to elevate newspaper style as a lofty value to be defended. If the current phase of language evolution is to a less formal language, with less-strict rules for grammar and style, I have confidence that great writers will continue to use the language to tell spellbinding, accurate and important stories.
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Steve Buttry. Steve Buttry said: New blog post: Publishers have to weigh the value of clean copy: http://bit.ly/e8dM3S […]
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Insightful post, Steve.
I’ve actually once used AP style just to have it changed by an editor to non-AP style (not in a newspaper setting.). Also never heard from the public that AP style wasn’t used.
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Very interesting post, Steve. I agree that clean copy may not be as valued as it used to be, but copy that has a lot of errors is very distracting. I do wonder if the role of copy editors will continue to change as the industry evolves. For example, maybe a mobile copy editor will be trained differently from today’s copy editor. He might focus more on making copy more SEO friendly, or using shortened language (i.e. 2 instead of two) when a story is written especially for cellphones or some other digital platform.
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Thanks for defining the debate in my head. On one side, with shrinking staff, we’re trying to get pages produced and out the door. Of course, we want clean copy, too. It would be nice to do less editing of AP copy … if AP actually followed AP style consistently. I’m still trying to make the Virtual Copy Desk work among our four McClatchy papers and while we’ve eliminated a lot of redundancy in editing and pagination, there is still room for more efficiency. I like your suggestion of “hybrids” and separating the heavy design from the heavy editing pages.
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The same kind of cost-cutting rationalizations were used by the American auto industry and led to crappy cars no one would buy. General Motors, the largest corporation in the world, went bankrupt.
“Hybrid’ copy editors / designers / producers are already part of the landscape, along with smaller staffs, and younger less experienced staffs. Chains can only shift responsibility for doing the job right so many times. First line editors took the load when reporters were cut. Then copy desks. Now…? Consolidated desks don’t even pretend to be a solution. They’re just better than no editing, or shipping those jobs off to India, right?
As for the idea that language is somehow now in a “less formal” evolution, George Orwell answered that line of reasoning in 1946 with his famous essay, Politics and the English Language. (http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm) The opening graph:
“Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it. Our civilization is decadent and our language — so the argument runs — must inevitably share in the general collapse. It follows that any struggle against the abuse of language is a sentimental archaism, like preferring candles to electric light or hansom cabs to aeroplanes. Underneath this lies the half-conscious belief that language is a natural growth and not an instrument which we shape for our own purposes.”
Later he adds: “I said earlier that the decadence of our language is probably curable. Those who deny this would argue, if they produced an argument at all, that language merely reflects existing social conditions, and that we cannot influence its development by any direct tinkering with words and constructions. So far as the general tone or spirit of a language goes, this may be true, but it is not true in detail. Silly words and expressions have often disappeared, not through any evolutionary process but owing to the conscious action of a minority.”
As Orwell went on to argue, language is “…as an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought.” And it is an instrument that needs care and responsible use.
Orwell saw political language as the primary threat back in the 1940s (“…political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible”). Today he would likely add the language of marketing and corporations, and included the loaded language of commentary news as another dimension of political speech.
When it comes to the quality of language at newspapers, pretending all is well (or good enough) is disingenuous and only plays into the cost-cutting mentality that what is lost does not really matter. It does.
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Another excellent piece, Steve. But as an AP Style guy—meaning it’s what I was taught and the common standard I still use for my writing and editing—what concerns me about the looseness of today’s web content is the lack of consistency in some basic uses. I’m not married to AP Style; there are many things about it most people disagree with.
But its place and presence in the print industry is it’s a style used across almost all newspapers. There’s structure and consistency in things such as use of numbers, street addresses, proper nouns and perhaps a dozen other commonly used categories. Instead of free-form (or no) style being pretty much accepted by online media, I’d still like to see some enforcement of basic uses (whatever may be deemed).
Perhaps a simple online style guide that becomes the industry bible. It doesn’t need the detail and quirkiness of AP Style, but something that is easily to learn, practice and adhere, especially for the new wave of multitalented young journalists.
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Thanks for all these thoughtful comments. I also call your attention to Doug Fisher’s blog, where he has a detailed response to this post: http://bit.ly/i5LDt7
Among other things, Doug says copy editors need to “make an effective cost/value argument in the language executives use: Dollars and cents. In some quarters, I still sense a sense of fantasy – a fantasy that somehow there will be a massive lawsuit somewhere that will make “the industry” stand up and notice. Not going to happen.”
I may elaborate on this, but probably not until next week. I’m traveling this week and will let my granddaughter, sons and mother command more of my time than the blog. But I do appreciate this interesting discussion.
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Chiming in with a marketing perspective: as Steve’s friend notes, there is absolutely a branding issue associated with the quality of a newspaper’s copy. The small but vocal grammar/spelling/consistency police among a newspaper’s readership can do a lot of damage through the tell-10-people phenomenon — they tell 10 of their friends how stupid the newspaper made itself look through some copy-editing gaffe; those 10 people have their perceptions altered, they tell 10 people, etc. (Funny how this never happens when we get something right.) And this group is not limited to baby boomers and older; I run across plenty of really great young writers who have no tolerance for lazy writing.
So, while I understand the cost constraints, I do think Steve’s friend’s product quality argument has to remain in the discussion. I’d suggest part of the solution, as Steve notes above, is a relentless insistence on a minimum standard from the writers themselves. And I’m not even talking about AP stylebook consistency, although that would be nice; I’m talking about basic grammar, syntax, and spelling so that information gets conveyed clearly.
As Steve also notes, I think we have to be much more willing to upgrade when it’s necessary. My experience at smaller newspapers, and I am just as guilty of this on the sales side, is that it takes so long to recruit someone willing to work for what we’re able to pay that we feel compelled to compromise on quality of output. Perhaps we need to take a little time to calculate the hidden costs of low-quality output– brand erosion, loss of trust, resources devoted to fixing the problem — and build that in to our recruiting budget.
And finally, I would suggest this is an area where the industry can put some pressure on journalism schools and college newspapers. To offer a parallel example: I have just finished a graduate program where it was expected that I would have a working understanding of descriptive statistics, and if I didn’t, I would need to go get it on my own. The same argument can be made about journalism programs — students should come equipped with a basic understanding of grammar, syntax, and spelling, and if they don’t have it they need to go get it. (Personal aside: I worked on a big group project in my final semester, and in a couple of cases found the quality of writing among my colleagues to be far below what was asked of me in the eighth grade, so the problem is not limited to journalism!)
So while I completely agree with Steve that the opportunity cost of slavish adherence to foolish consistencies is no longer affordable, we need to be careful we don’t ignore the opportunity cost of lowering quality control too much, because that’s not affordable either.
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Steve, you give us a lot to think about. I’m optimistic enough, or foolish enough, to think that ultimately the big guys will realize that copy editing can’t be discarded like those nasty, impossible plastic packages it takes a blowtorch to open. We may be nasty and impossible, but we’re pretty useful, too. To address some of your points (I hope):
* How to achieve better editing, given staffing levels? Hire better editors. They’re out there; a lot of them have been let go by newspapers and other publications that have shrunk their staffs.
* It’s nice to think that reporters become more careful knowing that there are fewer people reading behind them, but that’s wishful thinking. Maybe we should be hiring better reporters, too. The copy I see is no cleaner than it was when we had double the editing staff. Quite the opposite, in fact.
* In the past couple days, I’ve saved my paper from saying that a city was considering “farming” its own school district (twice); from saying that retailers were expecting “descent” sales this month; and from printing incorrect figures for the S&P 500 (twice). That’s the tip of the iceberg. And I’m sure my colleagues have made similar saves. Can publications continue to support copy editing? Can they afford not to?
* Consolidating editing functions to a central location may be expedient, but it’s a minefield. Editors half a continent away, or even a few hundred miles away from the point of publication aren’t going to know that it’s known as Booker T., not Washington High; that it’s Skillman Street, not Avenue, Boulevard, or Drive; or that a theater is in Oak Lawn, not Oak Cliff. Local people know (or should); blunders like that aren’t going to ring a bell with people who don’t live where the paper is delivered. But let it get into print, and readers will think you’re just ignorant. Which, in such a case, you are.
Editing wire copy centrally may be less problematic, but designing pages for it isn’t. What’s important in one community isn’t necessarily what’s important in another. That’s something local people are sensitive to.
* You’re right on target in saying that “the solutions lie in some combination of better training, better hiring or better analysis of the workflow and responsibilities.” Yes, playing to people’s strengths (editing vs. designing, for instance) is a smart decision, and any paper that’s not doing that already is behaving pretty foolishly. But many papers have been doing this for years, even decades. Likewise, any paper that’s not playing to the strengths of people it already employs is missing a bet.
* I’d be surprised if anyone had complained that you weren’t following AP style, or any other. Most likely, only another journalist would care. But we still need style, regardless of whose. Partly, style is there to settle questions so they don’t need to be debated over and over, particularly on deadline. Is it yule or Yule? The public doesn’t give a rat’s ass; just pick one and stick to it.
And to respond to your response to Doug Fisher’s response: It’s unfortunate that there are still people who sanctify AP style, people who don’t understand that “insure” actually can mean the same thing as “ensure”; AP just doesn’t want you to use it that way. A lot of what AP says is open to debate. If a paper wants to deviate, it should. But then THAT should become the style.
* You say that papers haven’t employed proofreaders for decades. They do; they’re copy editors. You say that newspapers have never employed fact-checkers. They do; they’re copy editors. We’re doing a lot less of those things than we used to, but we’re still doing them.
That’s part of the evolution of the newsroom. When proofreaders disappeared, their jobs fell to the desk. When the backshop disappeared, its job fell to the desk. When the IT department disappeared (we outsourced it), some of its functions fell to the desk, however unofficially.
That goes to underscore one of your points: that newspapers (and online publications and whatnot) need to come to grips with the evolution of the business. Copy editing has to change to meet the needs of the industry – and copy editors need to understand that. But the industry needs to understand that the “editing” part of copy editing is essential.
It’s surely impossible to reduce the job to a “value proposition,” if by that you mean how much money copy editing saves the company vs. how much the staffing costs. But any publication that disregards or misunderstands what copy editing contributes is in danger of looking downright idiotic if it doesn’t have anybody to ask why a story says in one place that someone is raising nine foster kids, and in another place it says eight, and two of the “kids” in the photo that goes with it are clearly adults. Readers notice this stuff.
* “I have confidence that great writers will continue to use the language to tell spellbinding, accurate and important stories.” Sure, but what about the cop shop briefs, meeting stories and accident reports that are (face it) the bread and butter of our metro sections? They’re not what we enter in contests, but if they’re important enough to be in the paper, they’re important enough to be right – and readable. Copy editors make sure they are.
Anyway, thanks for letting me vent. And thanks for your post.
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I love Elaine’s post. It reminds me of a time in the late 1990s when I was asked to sub for a semester at the University of Maryland for a professor on maternity leave. The class: Copy Editing 201.
I had 18 journalism students. Most were sophomores and juniors. Profs and adjuncts like me were instructed to “kill them,” as in, this was a defining class for the major to eliminate them from journalism if they didn’t have the irrevocable right stuff. Of my students, roughly half were interested in radio/TV, six were in marketing and public relations, and the others were dreamers. Not one student was interested in print.
The grades: one A, three Bs, seven Cs, five Ds, one F and one dropped from the class.
This class was really hard, as it should be. But I also didn’t think it was fair to expect raw journalism students to learn all the basics of editing and style in a semester. The common complaint was, “Why do I need this if I’m going into TV?”And, “I’ve never gotten a C (or D or F) in my life! This isn’t fair!”
The one kid who got an A could have worked on almost any newspaper copy desk. He had a gift, understood language and absorbed style. Best of all, he was coachable, which is something I look for in all talent.
I helped him get an internship at the local Gazette weekly newspapers around metro D.C., which had a universal design and editing desk. He worked one day and quit, never to return to newspapers again.
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Dennis — I completely agree that it’s not fair to cram everything about editing and style into one semester, just like it’s not really feasible to ask an English major like me to grasp everything about descriptive statistics in one semester. But if language is going to be the coin in which you trade, I think it’s reasonable to expect that you have the basic building blocks mastered.
Then again, I was forced to take five years of secondary school Latin and seven years of secondary and college French and I spent the better part of my seventh grade year diagramming sentences (in English), so perhaps my expectations are unrealistic and what we’re really talking about is the abject failure of the U.S. public education system, a topic for an entirely different blog. 🙂
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I said earlier here that I might elaborate on my response to some of the comments about this blog post. At this point, though, I’m going to pass. I had my say and I appreciate the varying viewpoints expressed here. Where I don’t agree, I don’t feel the need to have the last word.
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[…] Comments « Publishers have to weigh the value of clean copy […]
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I’m not sure that I buy your theory that a digital
operation can correct after publication with less damage. It
probably depends on the site and the statistics of their traffic.
If a page gets most of its traffic soon after posting, it doesn’t
matter if it is corrected long after most readers are done with it.
I saw this frequently when I used to work in the technology
department of a website connected to a large newspaper. It was very
common for a page to get nearly all of its pageviews within the
first few hours of publication, and correcting the page after that
wouldn’t have helped the most of the readers. Compare that to when
a newspaper would have morning and evening editions. (or even now
if a newspaper publishes multiple editions of the morning paper for
the suburbs) If a mistake is spotted, it can be fixed before many
more readers saw the error.
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