July 23, 2008

Spellcheck in titler: a feature request

Even though it means less fun and won't stop Fox News from abusing graphics, spell checkers in titling software is a good idea. Background on this one is at Crooks and Liars' FOX News Hilarity: Producers Misspell ‘Education’ During Segment on… Education.

Of course spelling improvements won't help the quality of news gathering upon which the society depends. It'll be interesting to see the shakeout from financial meltdowns; for example the San Francisco Chronicle, even though dependent on wire services for years, is now losing $1 million a week according to Chris Hedges in Bad Days for Newsrooms—and Democracy.

Update: See the Democracy Now segment "Newspapers Suffer Spate of Layoffs, Decline in Circulation, Ad Revenue, Stock Price: A Roundtable Discussion on the State of the Industry," although news people should admit they've been late to the party in responding to things like Craigslist.org and alternative story forms for news writing.

And some print people would fight to the death over serial commas, while losing their ass over other ventures and make-work.

No comments: