It has been a very long time since I wrote a Confessions post, and since we’re in the first weeks of 2009, I figured it was high time.

As some of our loyal readers may already know, I’ve been an editor for quite some time, starting with my work as News Director at the Naval Media Center in Keflavik, Iceland. Since then I’ve edited everything from radio and TV scripts, press releases, articles, a whole forest of paper and a river of red ink. Today, my work editing Cheap Today.com doesn’t kill any trees, but some things remain the same no matter what you’re editing.

Including one of my all-time pet peeves; sacrificing accuracy for speed. CNN was guilty of this recently when reporting a military plane crash in California. The anchor or his script writers assumed that if it had wings and an engine, it must belong to the Air Force.  It’s an easy mistake to make, but one the CNN crew knows better than to make.

Another example I found recently hit my inbox courtesy of a writing group mailing list I signed up for once upon a time. I confess, I kind of like these mailing list groups…they give me plenty of fodder for posts like this.  Continue reading Confessions of An Editor: New Year, Same Old Pet Peeves →