I was having this conversation yesterday. My son reports <g> that the job which
has almost vanished in the media in recent years is the sub-editor. He began as
a copy editor (proof and fact checker at Dow Jones) and that's a role which has
dried up as well.
I put this down to new technology. When I began work in advertising in the late
sixties, I handwrote and my copy was typed and checked to some extent by an
experienced typist and then by a manager whose mission in life was to improve
my output. I saw a lot of blue pencil for the first six months. Now, everyone
up to middle management does their own typing on screen and, guess what, many
of them aren't particularly literate.
This is found in the media as well - the people who type up the auto prompts
where it doesn't matter also type the bottom of screen 'tickers', where it
does. Journalists write their own on the spot and feed it directly into the
layout with minimal supervision. Checking is a last minute task where, in the
better outlets, fact checking takes precedence - you don't get sued for badly
split infinitives. Juniors expect to hit the bricks straight away without an
apprenticeship back in the room, doing the support work and learning to write.
Consequently, hopeless syntax and poor usage which wouldn't have survived 8th
grade a few years ago now makes it through to screen and print.
I had a student many years ago who had very average writing skills but who
became a successful journalist because she had the personality and drive to do
it (she ended up at the News of the World for a while!). However, she had the
backup of better writers to molest her copy, people who couldn't have found a
story with a flashlight and an instruction book - but they could write. Two
different jobs. Now they're both being done by one person, the one who can't
write that well.
How's that for an analysis, Bob?
Andrew Fildes
afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
www.soultheft.com
Author/Publisher: The SLR Compendium - http://www.blurb.com/books/3732813
On 18/02/2013, at 8:33 AM, Tina Manley wrote:
> These were all "crowd sourced". Free content provided by readers. I think
> the Beeb had huge funding cuts and let many people go - including the
> fact-checkers - like most media outlets these days.
--
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