My Role: Sub Editor

This semester I am one of four sub editors for Winol. This includes making sure that reporters articles have the following: Correct punctuation, it makes sense when read, no defamation or legal problems and a video or picture. I also help with the maintenance of the Winol website and make sure that it looks perfect.

When I first started there were lots of rules to follow and editing a simple article took about half an hour. 10 weeks on however and as long as the article has a picture/video with no legal problems can take about 15 minutes. The main rules I look for throughout is that the punctuation is correct, any names or places are spelt correctly, the picture is 100 by 75 and does not bleed in to the text, that the top line is punchy, not too long and in bold. This is the beginning to editing an article. Sounds simple but when the rules of the punctuation come about it makes it a lot harder. Below is a sample of our house style, little points that should be taken care with, within each article that I sub; these come up most often.

- With quotes if you are taking a snippet of what someone is saying do not put the full stop before the end quote, put it after. However if you are taking the whole quote and it finishes at the end, you put the full stop before the end quote.

For example, Alice said, "eat the apple".

Alice said, "eat the apple, then put it in the bin please."

The first example is a snippet of the quote and therefore she has not finished speaking so the full stop is on the outside of the quotation marks.

- Unless it is speech and is in quotes then words should not be shortened. For example: it's = it is, don't =do not, wont = will not etc.

- If you have : you need to start the next word with a capital. For example, the skirts she wanted were: Green, yellow, pink and orange. If you use ; you can just carry on with the sentence.

I thought that being a sub editor would be really good and easy. I know how to spell and it is a pet hate of mine when something is written and does not make sense or when the punctuation is incorrect. I did not realise there would be so many rules to follow and how easy it is to let an article slip on to the Internet that could be wrong, defamatory or with one simple fact that has one word wrong; completely changing the sentence meaning. I have, however, come to really enjoy editing and even the rules are starting to stick, I remember them and spot them a lot quicker than I first did.

In order to get the pictures and videos on to the article I have even learnt some basic html codes and can now organise the look of the article in the html section, when before, it looked like an alien language. Sometimes it is confusing, annoying and just damn right irritating but getting a hold on it now means that I can make the articles look good by myself. It means that I now have a skill that I can share with other people.

In the first few weeks it felt like I was never going to get the editing correct, the picture the right size, the 'read more' sign in the right place, the html code correct but I am very happy to say that I am now 100% confident with my editing. I also think that it may be a different path in to Journalism I take. I love writing and would love to one day be writing articles that are read by thousands each month but if sub editing offers me a different route in to my chosen career I am very glad that I have been able to experience and learn this part of the job. It also opens up for me editing books, not exactly the career I have studied for but none the less, a job that does now appeal to me. Learning it now saves me from screwing up in the real world. Where letting an article on to the Internet that has any legal problems does not get me sued.