Strip search finds crack between buttocks

A gift of a story for the sub-editor generates another classic naughty headline, this time courtesy of WYFF4 television station in South Carolina (via Common Sense Journalism). Did this make the TV news too? Would love to have seen the anchor deliver the line.

Starting to gather quite a collection of rude heads – see Top 10 rudest headlines in the world ever, possibly from the hyperbolic list era of 2008, and some more recent headline funnies.

Girls’ school still offering ‘something special’ – head

Fantastic! Can’t believe I missed this one but I shall belatedly add this to my list of naughtiest headlines. Did the sub know? Or is it a classic blooper? It’s been  fixed for the online edition but the lovely internet has already archived a scan of it and sent it around the world. (It was sent to me by an Aussie journalist friend who saw it in The Australian.)

Reminds me of the time I left a reporter’s headline on a music review and got roundly told off on delivery day for ‘Sweet folk all’.  You can read the story of that in my post on the Top 10 rudest headlines in the world ever, possibly.

Nose abatement – not quite the new Wanky Balls

But still a rather lovely headline typo NOT spotted by the subs of the Birmingham Post and another indicator that inaccuracies can a story make (cf Wanky Balls). It’s getting comments so maybe it will stay. Spotted by Getgood.

See, typos can be good.

Reuters doesn’t look a Gay-Dix gifthorse in the mouth

This super pun headline worthy of the tabloids is actually from Reuters and headlines the Olympic bronze medalist Walter Dix beating former world champ Tyson Gay in a 200m race last week. Thank goodness, Dix didn’t come from behind and there wasn’t a final Gay spurt is all I’m saying.

LOLcat grammar

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Pick of the links (12 Feb-22 Sept 2009)

• Web version of a mag production desk
  A suggested migration path for print subs.
• No need for sub-editors – Roy Greenslade
  (with 100 comments adding to the debate)
• The Guardian’s follow-up to Roy’s rant
  ‘Subeditors are under attack from cost-cutting newspaper groups – and Roy Greenslade. So do they have a future?’
• How do you sub live stories – and add value?
  Adam Tinworth on the nature of real-time news.
• A survival guide for sub editors and other curmudgeons
• FT plans for new ‘web ready workflow’ leaked; ‘right first time’ approach for filing copy
  ‘…sub-editors will edit, check and revise these elements and add multimedia and interactive features, and be responsible for revising content for print and online.’
• Automated sub-editing – could this replace you?
  ‘Tansa provides enterprises with advanced text proofing tools.’
• The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks
  Say no “more”.

Subslink: 39 strange but true newspaper headlines

Bit of fun after recent rantings. Headlines include, the ridiculous:

Alton Attorney Accidentally Sues Himself

the badly-worded:

Chicken with artifical legs dies a hero

and the intriguiing:

Hairdo kills mum

For the full list, go here.

Freelancing in the nude?

Nice tablecloth. Pic: Cronewynd/Flickr

Was bemused to listen to the awful Freelance National Anthem – but think the endline is wrong. Freelance writers have the the joy of working in pyjamas. Working ‘in the buff’ is just plain wrong. Or am I being naive?

What do you wear when working from home? And, less contentiously, what time do you get dressed?

Maybe the writer just couldn’t find a rhyme for pyjamas…

Storking the typo-makers

You can publish then edit all you like but, beware, the original may still be ‘out there’ – and there are people willing to spot it, tweet it, snap it, blog it and generally announce it to the world. Like this one from Tom Ackroyd who took a snapshot of a 3News headline typo tonight (since corrected) and uploaded it to Twitpic before tweeting me:

Too heavy for the stalk: newborn weighs in at 6.4kg

Beauty. It makes me think fondly of all those job adverts for sub-editors asking for the ‘ability to spot a literal at 50 paces’.

Even funnier is that the original 50-pace typo spotter uknzguy has pointed out that the error has been immortalised in the URL.

Note to self:  check my permalinks! Thank Buddha, there’s an edit function in WordPress for just this kind of cock-up.

‘My tornado hell’, my red pen heaven

My Tornado Hell (revisited) – I can’t quite believe this now classic 2006 feature, about a windy day in Kensal Rise, went past the Evening Standard’s subs’ desk unscathed. Maybe the copy editors didn’t know where to start. Either that or writer Caroline Phillips has got mates high up.

…vomiting clementines, speared American walnut floating shelves, non-demurring loss adjustors called Simon, primal screams and a brilliant trauma specialist therapist, all wrapped up in a windy metaphor triple decker sandwich.

Best thing I’ve read in ages. Someone send Caroline to a war zone, please.

Here’s the follow-up: Tornado Alley, the final fallout
And the Mumsnet thread, featuring my favourite comment from Unquiet Dad who’s cast My Tornado Hell: the movie with Jude Law starring as THE ASSESSOR