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The Error of our Ways
November 16, 2009
In the daily rush to produce a newspaper, sometimes things go horribly wrong. In
the apology that may (or may not) follow, the mistake is often blamed on a "production
error", thereby absolving individuals from blame, even if those in the newsroom
know exactly who the culprit was.
There have been some classic errors in newspapers and magazines during my time in
journalism over the past 30 years. Often, when a layout designer sends the page
to the sub-editors for editing and the writing of headlines, they will fill the
space with "headline goes in here and here" because they can't process it with a
blank. And guess what? Once - and only once in my time - that's exactly how the
headline appeared in the paper the next day!
Other classic gaffes include: Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers, Juvenile
Court to Try Shooting Defendant, Red Tape Holds Up New Bridges, Local High School
Dropouts Cut in Half, and Typhoon Rips Through Cemetery: Hundreds Dead. And there's
many more where those came from!
Those are humorous examples, of course, but there have been many costly ones for
newspapers, too. Only last week I saw a man wrongly identified in a caption as the
alleged killer police were looking for. The man pictured was in fact the suspect's
brother.
These are all gentle reminders of the need for journalists right along the production
process to take great care with their work. That's why, even now, I still double
check what might appear to be dubious facts or figures or unusual spellings.
And let's face it, the ability to check most things now is at our fingertips via
the internet. Long gone are the days we had to phone the cuttings library to do
this kind of research.
Sloppiness is not welcome by editors, nor readers for that matter, so it is crucially
important to get it right.
Happy writing!
Gary Smith
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