Combined editing center's head bust

[lone star scribe]

In a 1A story in the Durham (NC) Herald-Sun about a new PhD program at N.C. Central, some editor in Kentucky "improved" the story by moving the program to N.C. State.

The Durham newspaper is edited by Paxton's combined editing center in Owensboro, Ky.

It's just the latest example of how editors working 600 miles away with no context for the local newspaper can screw up.

Here's the link:

http://blogs.plos.org/takeasdirected/2011/10/08/university-milestone-dashed-by-distant-copy-editing/

 

[HejiraHenry]

Having never really in such a setting, I do have a question for someone who does or has ... don't you get page proofs at some point? I get PDFs every night of every page when I'm not in my office.

 

[lone star scribe]

I'm not sure how Paxton is doing it (other than probably not very well), but the general aim of these centers was to eliminate nighttime staff at the "home" newspaper. Otherwise there's that dreaded duplication. I'm guessing they don't want to pay an editor to wait around all night for page proofs at deadline.

 

[SF_Express]

I think it's a hell of an assumption on the blogger's part that the Kentucky desk changed something provided accurately to them.

It might be a little better than 50/50 that the origination guys sent the right school, but **** happens.

 

[SportsGuyBCK]

Still, someone obviously didn't read the story, because it clearly says "N.C. Central" ... but its sounding like the Paxton operation is following in the mold of Media General's N.C. community setup, where there's less and less time spent on copy editing and more time spent on pagination ... either way, it's gonna get someone sued for libel and slander when something really really bad gets in a story, doesn't get caught during the limited editing process and makes it into print ... would love to see the excuses handed out then ...

 

[KJIM]

"How could this happen when there are only two universities and one community college in the city of Durham, NC?"

ONLY two universities and one community college? How many do most cities have?

Also, the header in question is so tiny I didn't even notice it at first. That doesn't excuse the error, but I wonder how many readers caught the mistake at *first* glance. I was looking for it and didn't see it.

 

[lone star scribe]

"How could this happen when there are only two universities and one community college in the city of Durham, NC?"

ONLY two universities and one community college? How many do most cities have?

Also, the header in question is so tiny I didn't even notice it at first. That doesn't excuse the error, but I wonder how many readers caught the mistake at *first* glance. I was looking for it and didn't see it.

I think the blogger's point was that N.C. State is in Raleigh, not Durham, and an NC editor would know that. Kentucky, not so much.

 

[User 4332]

I saw this in print the other day. The messed up header wasn't huge, but it was certainly noticeable. I didn't even have to read the story to know what the mistake was, since it made no sense at all that State would be adding its first PhD program, but made 100% sense that Central would.

My first thought was that it was an awfully embarrassing mistake for the H-S. I hadn't even considered that it was the result of someone in another state making it.

 

[LongTimeListener]

Is every bad headline from now on going to be attributed to consolidation and the new way of doing things? Because this error would not rank in the top 1 million of headline-related errors in the history of newspapers. When I was in college in the early '90s, we got a good chuckle out of a USA Today graphic that tried to show Wisconsin was at the top of the list for something or other but instead highlighted Minnesota. I guess it's because USA Today didn't have a local editing desk in Wisconsin or Minnesota.

 

[Drip]

Is every bad headline from now on going to be attributed to consolidation and the new way of doing things? Because this error would not rank in the top 1 million of headline-related errors in the history of newspapers. When I was in college in the early '90s, we got a good chuckle out of a USA Today graphic that tried to show Wisconsin was at the top of the list for something or other but instead highlighted Minnesota. I guess it's because USA Today didn't have a local editing desk in Wisconsin or Minnesota.

Long Time, the powers that be don't care. They really don't. So many errors are making their way in print and on the Web. This is what the business has become and unfortunately things are getting worse. It is what it is.

 

[ondeadline]

How about this weekend head bust from McClatchy's consolidated desk in Charlotte that appeared in the N&O:

http://desmond.yfrog.com/Himg875/scaled.php?server=875&filename=yzzp.jpg&res=iphone

Or this piece of fine editing in the N&O over the weekend. Second graf is brutal and never mind that the final score isn't mentioned:

http://desmond.yfrog.com/Himg878/scaled.php?server=878&filename=wv5g.jpg&res=iphone

 

[beanpole]

For how many decades did newspapers get 'gotcha' phone calls and letters from readers about mistakes? And how many of us threw them away and said, "My God -- you publish a million words a day, you're going to have a few wrong." Happened all the time in my newsroom.

We're doing the same thing here. I understand people are pissed about editing centers and the state of the business. But let's not pretend that papers were spotless before desks started consolidating.

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well. And crappy editors can screw up a page regardless of where they're sitting.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well.

Sorry, I have to disagree with that out of hand. I appreciate your point that mistakes happen regardless -- I've made my share. My first experience with remote editing was in 1980, just before the whole "cluster" thing took hold. More recently, I've been involved in adding a bunch of local things to my newspaper's upcoming stylebook update, and most of that is really arcane stuff that no outsider could ever possibly know or figure out by Googling, but our readers certainly would pick up on it if we got it wrong. In fact on some of them, if you did not live here, you would have to be some sort of supergenius to even know enough to look it up in the first place -- such as separate municipalities with the same name existing side by side. I live in one weird ****ing state and nobody in Nebraska or Tennessee is going to understand even half of what we do here.

 

[SF_Express]

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well.

Sorry, I have to disagree with that out of hand. I appreciate your point that mistakes happen regardless -- I've made my share. My first experience with remote editing was in 1980, just before the whole "cluster" thing took hold. More recently, I've been involved in adding a bunch of local things to my newspaper's upcoming stylebook update, and most of that is really arcane stuff that no outsider could ever possibly know or figure out by Googling, but our readers certainly would pick up on it if we got it wrong. In fact on some of them, if you did not live here, you would have to be some sort of supergenius to even know enough to look it up in the first place -- such as separate municipalities with the same name existing side by side. I live in one weird ****ing state and nobody in Nebraska or Tennessee is going to understand even half of what we do here.

Frank said it before I did. I appreciate the contrarian view -- that mistakes happen regardless of desk consolidation and editing centers, which is true -- but they'll happen more often, and be far less likely to be caught, if somebody editing the story knows nothing about where the story is happening.

 

[playthrough]

For how many decades did newspapers get 'gotcha' phone calls and letters from readers about mistakes? And how many of us threw them away and said, "My God -- you publish a million words a day, you're going to have a few wrong." Happened all the time in my newsroom.

We're doing the same thing here. I understand people are pissed about editing centers and the state of the business. But let's not pretend that papers were spotless before desks started consolidating.

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well. And crappy editors can screw up a page regardless of where they're sitting.

What do you do now with the "gotcha" call? "Yes sir, let me transfer you to our editing center five states away, they'll be happy to talk to you."

 

[beanpole]

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well.

Sorry, I have to disagree with that out of hand. I appreciate your point that mistakes happen regardless -- I've made my share. My first experience with remote editing was in 1980, just before the whole "cluster" thing took hold. More recently, I've been involved in adding a bunch of local things to my newspaper's upcoming stylebook update, and most of that is really arcane stuff that no outsider could ever possibly know or figure out by Googling, but our readers certainly would pick up on it if we got it wrong. In fact on some of them, if you did not live here, you would have to be some sort of supergenius to even know enough to look it up in the first place -- such as separate municipalities with the same name existing side by side. I live in one weird ****ing state and nobody in Nebraska or Tennessee is going to understand even half of what we do here.

Here's my point -- AP for years edited every national story out of New York. Editors there did a damned good job, and they didn't have to be in the same bureau where the reporter worked. Today, even the state-level copy is being edited in Philly, Atlanta, Phoenix and Chicago. It's being edited by talented editors who, 99 times out of 100, make the copy better.

Metros across the country have reporters and editors working in different locations. Hell, you can't tell me that a NYT dispatch out of Egypt isn't being edited well because the person doing the line editing is in Paris or New York.

I know those are extreme examples. But I think that editing centers can work if they're done right. You have to have a talented group of editors. You *must* have the home paper maintain editorial control, including deciding what story is going to go on what page and how it wants news played. You have to give editors a realistic workload.

By all means, I would rather have a dedicated copy desk for every newsroom, and for a copy editor to be able to walk over to a reporter's desk rather than sending an instant message to the city desk of whatever paper he or she happens to be working on at that moment. That's when newspapers -- or any newsgathering organization -- runs best. I worry tremendously about companies that try to run consolidated editing centers as half-assed as I've seen a lot of newsrooms. I worry that the companies that will be the first to try consolidated editing will do such a bad job that they'll do lasting harm to the papers.

But I still believe that a center with strong editors can do good work, given the opportunity. I just don't know if the Paxtons and Gannetts of the world will be able to do it.

 

[beanpole]

For how many decades did newspapers get 'gotcha' phone calls and letters from readers about mistakes? And how many of us threw them away and said, "My God -- you publish a million words a day, you're going to have a few wrong." Happened all the time in my newsroom.

We're doing the same thing here. I understand people are pissed about editing centers and the state of the business. But let's not pretend that papers were spotless before desks started consolidating.

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well. And crappy editors can screw up a page regardless of where they're sitting.

What do you do now with the "gotcha" call? "Yes sir, let me transfer you to our editing center five states away, they'll be happy to talk to you."

I think that a newspaper that is being produced at a consolidated editing center has to maintain editorial control. They have to have someone in the newsroom to decide what story they want to have one what page and how to handle late-breaking national or local news. So yeah, the newspaper is still going to get a phone call from the public complaining about a bad head or a missed jumpline. And reporters will ***** about taking those calls just like they always have.

 

[Tarheel316]

Still, someone obviously didn't read the story, because it clearly says "N.C. Central" ... but its sounding like the Paxton operation is following in the mold of Media General's N.C. community setup, where there's less and less time spent on copy editing and more time spent on pagination ... either way, it's gonna get someone sued for libel and slander when something really really bad gets in a story, doesn't get caught during the limited editing process and makes it into print ... would love to see the excuses handed out then ...

Yeah, really.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well.

Sorry, I have to disagree with that out of hand. I appreciate your point that mistakes happen regardless -- I've made my share. My first experience with remote editing was in 1980, just before the whole "cluster" thing took hold. More recently, I've been involved in adding a bunch of local things to my newspaper's upcoming stylebook update, and most of that is really arcane stuff that no outsider could ever possibly know or figure out by Googling, but our readers certainly would pick up on it if we got it wrong. In fact on some of them, if you did not live here, you would have to be some sort of supergenius to even know enough to look it up in the first place -- such as separate municipalities with the same name existing side by side. I live in one weird ****ing state and nobody in Nebraska or Tennessee is going to understand even half of what we do here.

Here's my point -- AP for years edited every national story out of New York. Editors there did a damned good job, and they didn't have to be in the same bureau where the reporter worked. Today, even the state-level copy is being edited in Philly, Atlanta, Phoenix and Chicago. It's being edited by talented editors who, 99 times out of 100, make the copy better.

Metros across the country have reporters and editors working in different locations. Hell, you can't tell me that a NYT dispatch out of Egypt isn't being edited well because the person doing the line editing is in Paris or New York.

Apples, oranges. If the dispatch out of Cairo or Cleveland is botched in New York for a paper in Richmond, not many people in any of the cities are going to know. The people in Cairo, Cleveland and New York usually don't read the Virginia paper, and few Richmond readers know Cairo and Cleveland very well. If the dispatch out of Richmond is botched by editors in New York for the Richmond paper, then you have a problem, which is what we're discussing here.

 

[beanpole]

Good editors can edit remotely, and do it well.

Sorry, I have to disagree with that out of hand. I appreciate your point that mistakes happen regardless -- I've made my share. My first experience with remote editing was in 1980, just before the whole "cluster" thing took hold. More recently, I've been involved in adding a bunch of local things to my newspaper's upcoming stylebook update, and most of that is really arcane stuff that no outsider could ever possibly know or figure out by Googling, but our readers certainly would pick up on it if we got it wrong. In fact on some of them, if you did not live here, you would have to be some sort of supergenius to even know enough to look it up in the first place -- such as separate municipalities with the same name existing side by side. I live in one weird ****ing state and nobody in Nebraska or Tennessee is going to understand even half of what we do here.

Here's my point -- AP for years edited every national story out of New York. Editors there did a damned good job, and they didn't have to be in the same bureau where the reporter worked. Today, even the state-level copy is being edited in Philly, Atlanta, Phoenix and Chicago. It's being edited by talented editors who, 99 times out of 100, make the copy better.

Metros across the country have reporters and editors working in different locations. Hell, you can't tell me that a NYT dispatch out of Egypt isn't being edited well because the person doing the line editing is in Paris or New York.

Apples, oranges. If the dispatch out of Cairo or Cleveland is botched in New York for a paper in Richmond, not many people in any of the cities are going to know. The people in Cairo, Cleveland and New York usually don't read the Virginia paper, and few Richmond readers know Cairo and Cleveland very well. If the dispatch out of Richmond is botched by editors in New York for the Richmond paper, then you have a problem, which is what we're discussing here.

I agree that the biggest hurdle for centers is the local geography. How would a copy editor know that 21st Street should be 21st Avenue, or that the Olive Garden that burned down is on 23rd Street, not 32nd Street? Editing centers can always Google addresses to fact-check, but there's going to be more pressure on the city/metro desks at local newspapers to do decent first edits that catch those errors.

At the same time, the biggest hurdle for many small papers is keeping talented copy editors -- either because the publisher hacks the newsroom so much that they get laid off, or because anyone with serious editing talent migrates to a larger paper or out of the industry. I would bet there's plenty of papers out there with circulations 10K or less that would get better copyediting from an editing center than they currently get from their solitary copy editor/page designer/web producer. That's why I think that a group of talented editors in a centralized location can work in some situations.