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    #26
    Sub standard

    Duncan Gardner wrote:
    I'm just a bit puzzled that the process remains as detailed as you both describe, while at the same time no-one subbing Sam or Zoe picks up either the clumsy writing style, or even the author's failure to actually watch many of the programs he's reviewing.
    On the latter point particularly, that's not so much subbing as requesting/effecting a rewrite, which should have been done before it gets to the sub, but evidently isn't going to be if it's a regular contributor.

    Venne- point taken about the impossibility of a single editor being expert in factual material across many disciplines. But for the fluffier stuff, without much factual content, is that really a problem?
    Given the above (it's shite, but that's what the people in charge want) then yeah, if it were me I would just quickly wipe the copy's arse and not worry about trying to make it good, so long as it makes basic sense.

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      #27
      Sub standard

      I know this is only really a conversation between VS and me, but there's a bit more on this in the paper section of Media Guardian today, in a rare example of that section actually covering something that affects ordinary media workers:
      http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/feb/23/subeditors-cost-cutting-newspapers

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        #28
        Sub standard

        The truth is the existence of subs perpetuates the poor standard of copy provided by newspaper writers.

        Contrast their performances with those of their opposite numbers in broadcasting. TV and radio correspondents routinely report direct to the public. Off air, they write their own scripts without any intervention from subs. If they can do that, why can't their newspaper equivalents? The answer, sadly, is that the current system encourages them not to bother. I want to see a rise in journalistic skills among writers that will obviate the need for subs.
        Well, good luck with that, Roy, you myopic bell-end.

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          #29
          Sub standard

          He's done this throughout the debate, largely bypassing the criticisms raised in order to bayonet his own lovingly-crafted strawmen.

          Mr Groovy New Media does seem to be hopelessly out of touch with how an integrated newsroom actually works.

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            #30
            Sub standard

            Greenslade is only a couple of years away from retirement, so he probably doesn't really give a fuck either way how the whole thing pans out.

            Nice to see him giving the boss-class a few extra scrotal licks in his dotage, though.

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              #31
              Sub standard

              Quite. This is exactly what the one-time member of obscure maoist sect the Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) - not to be confused with the CPB or CPGB of course - is doing. Power-worship is never an edifying spectacle, but I suppose if you edited the Mirror under Maxwell (and ran one of its most famously inaccurate front-page smears ever, about Arthur Scargill), then you've at least got some experience of that.

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                #32
                Sub standard

                My goodness, what a strange thing to say, that subs aren't really needed anymore. I would take it further and advise that mechanics aren't needed anymore because we can fix our own cars by referring to car mechanic website.

                On my roster of writers, I have two or three whose work needs minimal subbing (and I count myself among them). The problem with subbing, at least in South Africa, is not that we don't need them, but that we desperately do need them but can't find many very good ones.

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                  #33
                  Sub standard

                  E10 Rifle wrote:
                  I know this is only really a conversation between VS and me...a rare example of that section actually covering something that affects ordinary media workers:
                  http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/feb/23/subeditors-cost-cutting-newspapers
                  Is this a closed shop then ?

                  I read it, hoping for some spiky comeback to Roy and Rommel's wind-up.

                  I didn't realise the media section was short of copy affecting hacks. Anyway, surely its brief is much wider, to include all readers generally interested? The sports page isn't written purely for premiership players' agents to read.

                  G-Man wrote:
                  I would take it further and advise that mechanics aren't needed anymore because we can fix our own cars by referring to car mechanic website
                  Sub "hot metal trades" for "mechanics" and haven't you got the crux of the problem?

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                    #34
                    Sub standard

                    There's an awful lot of stuff in the media section about broadcast (ie entertainment as well as news) and advertising. Maybe a quarter of it has to do with journalism as such, and much of that is gossip or speculation about editors, proprietors and such. There's not usually much about the nuts and bolts of journalism, and much of what there is, is written by Jeff Jarvis and leans toward techno-utopianism.

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                      #35
                      Sub standard

                      Roy Greenslade said:
                      Contrast their performances with those of their opposite numbers in broadcasting. TV and radio correspondents routinely report direct to the public. Off air, they write their own scripts without any intervention from subs.
                      Er, but they'd be overseen by the programme's editor, producers, VT/audio editors and lawyers, so I'm not sure what Roy's on about here. There's less intervention, but then there's less to worry about if you don't need to spell or punctuate anything.

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                        #36
                        Sub standard

                        The truth is the existence of subs perpetuates the poor standard of copy provided by newspaper writers.
                        This turned my eyes into saucers when I read it five minutes ago. They're still not back to normal. He's on an epic wind-up, but it's not remotely funny.

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                          #37
                          Sub standard

                          Also, we should get rid of cars because they're perpetuating our inability to run at 75mph.

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                            #38
                            Sub standard

                            We've been writing our stuff straight into boxes on Quark documents ever since I arrived at my paper (six years ago). And doing the headlines. If you're lucky someone might give it a quick scan before sending it down to production.

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                              #39
                              Sub standard

                              Didn't know you worked for 4-4-2.

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