Interactivity on the Internet needs more editing than copy on the page

Your piece on the importance of good copy (DW 17 September) made sense. But even design groups that attach importance to copy are mostly missing a trick.

Look at the way newspapers, magazines and books are produced. Of course, they have writers or journalists to assemble the words as well as designers to format the text and assemble the pages. But they also have editors to get the content, structure and tone of the publication right. And they have sub editors (in journalism) or copy editors (in book publishing) to polish the rough gems of copy that the writers deliver.

Why bother? Because the result is more effective communication.

Websites need editors even more than print publications, because interactivity adds another layer of complexity. There’s more to go wrong, and more need for someone to evaluate the publication from the reader’s point of view.

Chris Gill

chrisgill@editors.co.uk

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