Editing Detective, Pamela Di Pinto

Despite the best efforts of journalists and editors alike, mistakes still manage to sneak their way into news copy that is later published for the greater public's viewing. Mistakes in journalistic writing can leave readers questioning the reliability of the news source, along with its credibility and attention to accuracy. As a result, these mistakes can reflect poorly on both the journalist and the company he or she represents.

That being said, though, these mistakes are inevitable. Shannon Findlay mentions this point in an earlier blog post when she says, "Fact: humans are fallible. Fact: humans write news stories. By extension, the assumption can be made that news stories are likely to have mistakes in them." No journalist has a perfect track record, and, as the industry continues to shift to the online world, I think errors will only become more commonplace in journalistic writing. Online journalism is all about speed: Who can get the latest breaking news story out first? This leaves minimal time for editors to step in, or even for journalists to self-edit their piece before posting it to the Internet. This can lead to both factual and mechanical (grammar, spelling, style, etc.) errors:

Factual errors

The Toronto Star printed three (yes, three!) factual errors all from April 6, 2010:

• A witness was incorrectly identified in an article about a man on trial for raping and fatally stabbing a 20-year-old woman who knew he was carrying the HIV virus. The article listed Wendy Phillips as the witness, when it was actually Julie Phillips. The journalist didn't even know who testified at the trial?
  
• A photo caption accompanying an article about the high risk of rape for women in Haiti incorrectly identified Elmancia Dezameau as a rape victim. In fact, as the article correctly indicates, she was attacked, not raped. It's in the article! All the journalist had to do was transfer the same information over to the photo caption.
  
• An article about white-hat hackers incorrectly stated that Leigh Honeywell developed an anonymity layer for instant messenger programs. In fact, through a Google-funded program, he mentored a student who added an encryption layer to an existing application. One word: fact-checking.

*Note: The Toronto Star has a link to a corrections page (seen in the image below), where they acknowledge and correct such errors.









Mechanical errors

I read the edmontonjournal.com more than any other online publication. I always find mechanical errors, especially on their breaking news pieces:

• In today's edition, April 12, 2010, the word "only" was repeated twice in one sentence in a breaking news article about how employee statements will now be used as evidence in the ongoing investigation surrounding Syncrude:

"He said it traditionally is only excluded only in rare cases when it is deemed neither necessary nor reliable."

This is most likely the result of writing to deadline -- the basis of online journalism -- and can easily be fixed by removing one "only."

Journalists should always strive to produce error-free copy, regardless of the medium in which it reaches audiences. However, mistakes will be made, which means there will always be work for "editing detectives" like me!

Note: Image from www.cs4fn.org