Long live the copy desk

Finally, a story about copy editors. Happiness in five columns. Well, not exactly. According an opinion piece by Lawrence Downes of The New York Times, the news is not good for those who serve as the newspapers' "last line of defense." First, Downes laments the fact that the Newseum, the monstrous new homage to news on the Mall in Washington, fails to pay its respects to copy editors. After describing what copy editors do for a living, Downes notes that these hallmarks of newsroom history are a dying breed. It was his last line, however, that made me think:

... If newspaper copy editors vanish from the earth, no one is going to notice.

Not true! Sure, copy editors are never noticed, until they make mistakes. During my several years on several copy desks, no one ever said "nice catch on that comma in the third graf" or "great job cutting out the jargon in that police story." And the AP editors never once thanked me for letting them know when the numbers in the box scores they sent didn't add up. But, hey, I'm over it.

Several bloggers chimed in on the Downes article, including Kathy Schenck of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

New York Times readers had their say, too. I particularly love this ode, from David Eggenschwiler of Los Angeles:

Praise the poor copy editors, but please don’t bury them. As print and broadcast media descend further into pop gibberish as well as routine solecisms, we need copy editors to slow the slide into bad writing as the public standard. Even with them, I wince my way through newspapers; without them, life wouldn’t be worth living.

And getting back to the Newseum. Although it doesn't boast a specific section dedicated to copy editors, it does have the next best thing. The bathroom tiles are decorated with mistakes and corrections taken from newspapers. Here's an example, from the Web site dcpages.com.

Thanks, I needed that comma

How many commas are required in the following sentence?

According to a police spokesman because the threat was made over the phone the highest possible charge would have been harassment a misdemeanor.

The sentence in question was part of an exercise in my colleague's news writing class.

Ready for the answer? Three.

According to a police spokesman, because the threat was made over the phone, the highest possible charge would have been harassment, a misdemeanor.

My colleague was unsure about the final comma, the one after "harassment." I told him I was sure that a comma was needed, but I didn't know the rule. I have a pretty good "ear" for these things, but when people want to know the rules, I'm often thrown for a loop. I decided to look this one up in my trusty Associated Press Stylebook. Here's what I found. The final two words of the sentence are a "nonessential phrase," which is always preceded by a comma. Here's the Stylebook scoop from an entry titled "essential phrases, nonessential phrases":

An essential phrase is a word or group of words critical to the reader's understanding of what the author has in mind. A nonessential phrase provides more information about something. Although the information may be helpful to the reader's comprehension, the reader would not be misled if the information were not there.

Essential phrases are not set apart with commas.

Example of an essential phrase, also from the Stylebook:

We saw the award-winning movie "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." (The movie title is essential to the sentence because many films have won awards. It's not obvious to the reader that the author had this title in mind when writing the sentence.)

Example of a nonessential phrase:

We saw the 1975 winner in the Academy Award competition for best picture, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." (Only one movie won the best picture award in 1975, so the title is not essential. Without the title of the movie, the reader might be confused, but the author's meaning is clear.)

In case you were wondering, the same rules apply for essential and nonessential clauses.

Great story. Can you add some words, please?

Brevity. Conciseness. Using words wisely. It's something I try to teach my students. And it's something I hope every good journalist appreciates. But what about the publishers? I guess it depends on which type of publisher you are -- the type who cares about news and understands the business or the type who buys a newspaper to make money. (Can anyone say "oxymoron"?)

It seems that the latter type of publisher is in charge of the Tribune Company, which owns the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, and one of my favorites, the Hartford Courant.

A recent story in Editor & Publisher noted that the Tribune Company is planning to measure reporter productivity by the number of column-inches reporters produce. For all of you with real jobs, a column-inch is a measure used by newspaper people. It's based on a six-column newspaper page. Multiply one standard column across by one inch down and you get a column-inch. This is useful when selling adds and planning newspaper sections.

So what does the length of a story have to do with how well the reporter does his or her job? That's a good question. I mean, like, I guess I could think of something, but right now I'm much too busy padding this paragraph to impress my boss. Oh, wait, I'm sorry, I'm not a reporter for the Tribune Company. My mistake. I'll just keep those extra words in for now. No sense taking any chances. You never know who's reading.

This Slate story, which I read on a friend's facebook page, says it much better than I ever could. It's by Michael Kinsley.

I have a related story about the subject of column-inches. When I got my first newspaper job, I was paid by column-inch. I had just completed my first year of college, and I worked as a correspondent for the sports section of the now-defunct Milford Citizen in southern Connecticut. I think I made $1.05 an inch my first summer and got a huge raise to $1.15 an inch after my sophomore year. It was a great experience. I covered some interesting stories and learned a lot from sports editor Dom Amore, who now covers baseball for the Hartford Courant.

Why we do what we do... and why it's often dangerous

A lot of people go into journalism because they like to write. I agree that writing is an essential aspect of the craft. If you can't form clear, coherent sentences and combine them to create an interesting story, you won't do well as a reporter. But writing isn't really what our craft is all about.

Journalism is about getting the news to people. It's about telling them what they need to know in a timely manner. Sure, telling it well is important, too. But the fact that we tell people what's happening in their world is an essential part of society.

Two recent articles reminded me why journalism is so important to the world. One story is an old one. One story is current. Both make me proud to be a journalist. And both should be read by all current and future journalists.

The first story is that of Ida B. Wells-Barnett, one of the first investigative journalists to crusade against lynching. A new book by Paula J. Giddings, "Ida: A Sword Among Lions: Ida B. Wells and the Campaign Against Lynching," takes a fresh look at this important American. Richard Lingeman reviews the book in this week's New York Times Book Review. Lingeman begins his review with a lead that brings the importance of Wells' work into the present:

If slavery is America’s original sin, lynching is its capital crime. The historical memory dies hard: only last year, three nooses were hung from a schoolyard tree contested by white and black students in Jena, La.

Lingeman then tells Wells' story. If you haven't heard of Wells before, you need to read this review, and maybe even Giddings' book. Wells' work was dangerous -- in 1889, a white mob attacked her newspaper office and probably would have lynched her if she had not been out of town.

More than 70 years after Wells' death, the work journalists do is still dangerous in many parts of the world. One example is in Myanmar, where journalists are putting their lives at risk to cover the effects of the recent cyclone.

Clark Hoyt, the public editor of The New York Times, discussed the problems journalists face in Myanmar in Sunday's column. Hoyt wrote that the Times' editors decided not to identify a reporter covering the devastation because they feared for his safety. Here's an excerpt about the reasons the Times didn't give the reporter a byline:

Describing the situation in Myanmar, Susan Chira, the foreign editor, said that the correspondent entered the country on a tourist visa, was changing hotels frequently to evade the authorities and was initiating all contact with the newspaper because only the correspondent could judge when it was safe to talk. “We don’t like to go around breaking (a country’s) rules arbitrarily,” she said. “It leaves our reporters vulnerable. But it’s our duty to report, so we take a calculated risk in consultation with the reporters.”
The Times finally gave readers an explanation of the Myanmar situation on Thursday, in another article without a byline, saying that the ruling military junta barred foreigners from the areas of greatest damage, that the reporter had hidden in the bottom of a boat to get to the scene, and that the reporter’s name was being withheld to avoid detection.

But Myanmar isn't the only dangerous place for journalists. Hoyt's column also discussed the situation in Zimbabwe, where a Times reporter was recently arrested for doing his job. He was arrested for trying to tell people what was happening.

Telling people what's going on allows citizens to participate in the democratic process. When despots take over governments, one of the first things they do is to grab control of the media outlets. A free press is rare, and where it does exist, it should be protected.

So if you're thinking about going into journalism, remember that it's not all about writing great leads and learning AP style. It's important work that some people are willing to risk their lives for. It's something all journalists should be proud of.

For language lovers only

The school year just ended, and I'm a bit winded from grading all those finals. I'm not teaching this summer, so I'll have lots of time to post to this blog. Meanwhile, here's a link to William Safire's latest On Language column. The problems Safire tackles here make me feel like a wannabe. Wondering about the difference between ambivalent and ambiguous? Think you know what alliteration means? I admit I'm baffled when it comes to the present perfect. And I'm still waiting for the perfect present. Maybe for my next birthday.

To cut, or not to cut?

Just had to link to this post about editors at Paper Cuts, one of my favorite blogs. It's written by the editors of The New York Times Book Review.

Some of the reader comments on this blog are classic. One of my favorites, posted by Jeremy Spencer: "Cutting is an art not easily mastered."

One question that Paper Cuts brings up is just how much editing an editor is supposed to do. After all, at some point, if the editor makes enough changes, whose copy is it? When does the editor become the writer? I remember one classmate in college who claimed that each piece was like a body part, and the act of editing was like chopping off a limb. I wouldn't go that far. But I often wonder how much editing is too much. I tell students that if they want to change a lead, they should call the author first and discuss it. But that's not a very deep discussion.

What do writers and reporters out there think? What about editors?

This just in: Indonesia has no lungs

Was reading an Associated Press story the other day about a frog that breathes through its skin. At least that's what I suspect the story meant. The grammar in the lead makes me wonder.

Here's the lead:

BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) — A frog has been found in a remote part of Indonesia that has no lungs and breathes through its skin, a discovery that researchers said Thursday could provide insight into what drives evolution in certain species.

According the sentence, it's not the frog but a remote part of Indonesia that has no lungs and breathes through its skin. The problem is with placement, or misplacement, if we're being technical. Whatever precedes "that has ..." is what gets modified. So I would rewrite the sentence as follows:

In a remote part of Indonesia, a frog has been found that has no lungs and breathes through its skin, a discovery that researchers said Thursday could provide insight into what drives evolution in certain species.

Oops. I just realized another problem. The sentence is passive, meaning the subject is not doing anything. Active verbs are much more exciting, but sometimes a passive sentence works well. To fix the problem, we could change it to the following:

Researchers said Thursday that the discovery of a frog that has no lungs and breathes through its skin could provide insight into what drives evolution in certain species. The discovery occurred in a remote part of Indonesia.

Passive sentences are not only boring, they're longer than active ones. If you want a reader to enjoy your story and keep reading, it's a good idea to use active verbs. One way to ensure active sentences is to avoid the words "there are" and "there is." For example, don't say "there are about 13,000 students at the University of Northern Colorado." Instead, say something like "About 13,000 students attend the University of Northern Colorado." "Attend" is a much more interesting verb than "there are."