This is what happens when you dump copy editors:

Beancounters don't care.

Beancounters can't spell, anyway, so they wouldn't know the difference, especially when it comes to a proper name.

Beancounters major in math and accounting, not English. They count beans.

Side note: I once spelled an athlete's last name wrong the entire season. Not once did anyone bring it to my attention until the final home game, when the SID says something. I look at the media guide, and, yep, sure enough, it's spelled the same (incorrect) way that I had been spelling it all year. (No, the players didn't have names on the uniforms.) The SID and I remained friends.

 

Me too. Mr. Battaglia. His daughter was a senior and the hottest girl in school. Her best friend lived in my apartment building and was very attractive, too. The three of us walked to school together and my friends couldn't figure out how a nebbish like me could hang with those two. They thought I must have been paying the girls to walk with me.

 

First time I interviewed for a job at a daily, I misspelled the ME's name on my cover letter. His name was Hines. I spelled it like the ketchup. The entire interview was me apologizing and him explaining why I committed a heresy.

Funny thing was, he hired me.

 

Hank, I think we had the same English class. And maybe the same teacher, too.

 

UCLA had a football player, Marcus Patton, whose name was spelled wrong for 3 years in the media guide and, thus, in everybody's stories. Just before his senior year, he told the SID. The SID asked him why he didn't tell him before. He said he didn't care.
Real name: Marvcus Patton. He played 13 years in the NFL.

 

The guy knew you had a conscious and would be more likely to double-check things from then on.

 

C'mon, that's a joke, right?

 

Heinz is to Hines as conscious is to conscience.


In my paper today there was an oh-so-typical screwup.

There was a 6-inch blurb about how today was supposed to be a near record for heat (91 degrees).

Because an art element is needed for "design" purposes, designer decides, "Hey, I'll illustrate it with clip art of a thermometer." Clip art, by the way, has become a regular staple in our paper since our revolutionary redesign a few months ago. I think "photos.com" has more photo credits than any of our staffers recently.

Anyway, there are just a couple of tiny problems with the clip art that was used:

1. The thermometer was measuring in Celsius only.

2. The mercury reading was at 20C . . . otherwise known as room temperature.

http://www.photos.com/en/search/close-up?eqvc=2917673&oid=4131474

Nice job illustrating a story on record heat. :

 

That was before standardized spelling. No such thing as a misspelling back then.

 

I know copy editors serve a valuable purpose. Editors in general, do. We all need a second set of eyes to look at our work.

But shouldn't the onus sort of be on the writer to, you know, get their subject's name right? Read what they've written more than once, check for names and stats to be right? It's pretty easy to take a 2007 stat line and apply it to 2005.

We're writers because we hated math, but the concept given to us in 1st grade still applies - Check your work!

 

Why don't we ask spnited since he actually helped print it?

 

SI & si.com haven't fact checked a story or spelling in three years.

They don't have anybody left to do it.