Why Should I Register With E-EDITOR?
Only to help us get a better idea of who makes up the E-EDITOR community, so that we can tune the site to your needs. We certainly won’t be trying to sell you anything, or passing your name on to anyone else. If you feel you’ve been abused before by Web sites that tried to gain your trust, leave it for now. Give us a while to prove to you what this is all about and then see what you think.
How Do I Know E-EDITOR’s Judgement Calls Are Always Right?
You don’t. (Judgment? Judgement? OK, the rule is "judgement" in normal English, but "judgment" in legal contexts and in the US.) But there are several decades of top-level subbing experience behind the site, and a really passionate interest in raising the standards of business and technology writing. We’re not ivory-tower pedants, arguing grammatical points for the sake of it. No, we’re street-level pedants, arguing because it matters to us, and you. Watch and wait. If you’re as interested in getting business communication right as we think you are, you’ll grow to like the way we do things.
Why Should My Bosses Take Notice of E-EDITOR’s Style Recommendations?
Because getting the words wrong can be a very expensive mistake. In 2001, a Royal Mail survey came to the conclusion that British companies lost contracts worth £2 billion a year as a result of poorly written letters, brochures and reports. Bad grammar, opaque jargon and simple punctuation mistakes were all seen as serious turn-offs. When a potential customer has little hard information to go on, a sloppy Web page or an error-strewn brochure may be all the evidence that’s needed to create the impression of a flaky, unprofessional company.
Do You Accept Money to Mention Products in E-EDITOR?
No. We are as pure as the driven snow. And nobody offers us bribes, anyway.
How Is E-EDITOR Financed?
It isn’t. It doesn’t cost much and we like doing it and think it’s worth while.
Who Are E-EDITOR’s Heroes and Models?
Among writers? Stoppard, Wodehouse, Michael Bywater, Joni Mitchell, Ira Gershwin, Graham Greene, Douglas Adams, Smokey Robinson, Winston Churchill, Elvis Costello, almost the entire staff of The Economist, Dorothy Parker, Shakespeare and Mo Drake, the 1960s Young & Rubicam advertising copywriter who created "Beanz Meanz Heinz". Among editors, mostly forgotten people like Leslie Sellers, the one-time Daily Mail production editor who wrote two brilliant books for sub-editors, Doing It In Style and The Simple Sub’s Book. And Harold Evans, of the Sunday Times, who taught a generation of journalists how to make people read on. And two former friends and colleagues, Max Cuff and Nigel Thomas, both sorely missed.
