People who think writing TV news is easy have probably never done it well. What’s easy (unfortunately) is finding examples of BAD news writing–“simplistic, cliché and shallow,” says Jessica Grillanda, who teaches at Cambrian College in Ontario, Canada. Getting it…
Every year since 1975, Lake Superior State University has put out a list of words that should be banished for misuse, overuse or general uselessness. The school accepts nominations through its Web site and a committee selects the final list…
Here’s something I love about the Internet: the way it forces you to reconsider what you think you already know. Take the passive voice, for example. For years, I’ve urged journalists to avoid it in almost every circumstance. Writing in…
KARE-TV’s Joe Fryer knows a little something about good writing. He’s won three national Edward R. Murrow awards and five regional Emmys. Joe was one of my fellow instructors at this year’s NPPF Airborne TV Seminar in Rochester, N.Y., and…
Digital editing allows you to do amazing things with video, but the 2007 NPPA Editor of the Year urges editors to show restraint. Josh Shea of KCNC-TV in Denver was one of my fellow instructors at this year’s NPPF Airborne…
Yes, I know the headline is misspelled (and yes, there are two s’s in misspelled). Does this matter to broadcast journalists? You bet it does. But it’s a relatively new concern, says KARE-TV reporter Joe Fryer. We really didn’t need…
We live in a multimedia world, surrounded by images, but words still have power. That’s what I took away from a Newsweek feature about two new English versions of Tolstoy’s “War and Peace.” The piece quotes one of the translators,…
