Wednesday, October 27, 2010...11:33 pm

Independent “i”: please employ more sub-editors

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A few days ago I wrote, perhaps optimistically, that if “i” follows the Metro model, it’ll rely heavily on sub-editors to put the paper out, which should offer the benefit at least of raising standards of proofreading accuracy.

How did that work out?

Well, I didn’t catch the paper on its first day, but a skim through today’s offering revealed the paper will prove fertile ground for subbing bloggers.

It seems Apple users are “upgarding” to iPhoto 11. A story about geographic patterns of smoking among pregnant women in the UK is headlined “Pregnant drinking”. And a slightly mangled pullquote from a feature about a Spanish TV show on Spain’s royal family reads:

“The show portrays the prince as grappling between love and responsibility”.

Which, let’s face it, isn’t something you’d really be able to do.

Yes, I know I’m nit-picking. And actually the rest of it doesn’t look too bad. But it’s just that I’m so disappointed in the missed opportunity. If nothing else, demanding higher standards could have given some of the nation’s many unemployed sub-editors a slice of much-needed work…

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