Prepared text of the keynote speech delivered by Mike Waller, publisher
of  the Baltimore Sun , on Sept. 11, 1998, at the ACES banquet in
Portland, Ore. Waller departed freely from this text, and not all of his
interpolations have been preserved.

Thanks very much for the opportunity to be here. I knew I was at a copy
editors' banquet when I saw people proofreading the wine list tonight.
Good copy editors never know when to quit, do they?

When I first accepted this invitation, I was worried, frankly, because
I'm a big baseball fan and this convention coincides with the opening of
the last home stand of the Baltimore Orioles. So I was afraid I would
miss some thrilling games in a down-to-the-wire pennant race. But the
Orioles relieved me of those anxieties a few weeks ago when they totally
collapsed and their season went into the tank.

Seriously, though, I very much wanted to be here for this conference
because I'm delighted that your formed this organization and presented
this great program. Great copy editing is an essential element of a
great newspaper, and I think it's terrific that you have formed this
society to improve and build respect for your craft.

That's what I want to talk to you about tonight -- improving and
building respect for your craft. And I think they go hand in hand.
Continuous, relentless improvement is essential in everything we do.
Unfortunately, our own newspapers have been full of embarrassing
examples recently that show we still have a lot of improving to do when
it comes to accuracy. And believe me, every time one newspaper makes a
mistake, especially a high-profile mistake, it hurts the credibility of
every newspaper.

So improvement in all aspects of what we do is obviously important. But
building respect for your craft within the newsroom is just as
important. Because without that respect, you will not have the influence
you need to effect change. And that is the bottom line for how effective
you are as a copy editor.

There's really no mystery to how to improve as copy editors. First, set
your standard at the highest level -- perfection. Nothing short of that
will ever be enough. Then work your butt off every day to try to achieve
the impossible. It doesn't matter that you can't achieve it; it only
matters that you try.

When I was on the copy desk of the Louisville Courier-Journal and Times,
we would come in every afternoon and tell each other, "Tonight's the
night! Not one single error is going to get past me tonight! The slot is
not going to bounce one of my headlines tonight!"

Of course, it never quite happened. But that was our rallying cry, night
after night. And knowing that each of your co-workers on that rim had
the same goal and was working just as hard as you were to make it happen
was a terrific inspiration and unifying force for all of us. We loved
copy editing. We couldn't believe we were getting paid to do this. And
at the Courier-Journal and Times, excellence was the No. 1 goal.

So, set high standards. Next, be a dogged questioner. Your job is to
continually ask those around you, "Do we really want to do this?" Your
job is to raise red flags. You've got to be willing to come back time
after time, night after night, and ask that same question again and
again. If your feelings get hurt and you stop asking questions just
because you lose most arguments -- and you WILL lose most -- you'll
never be a great copy editor. Face it -- you're not gonna win many. I
used to think I was doing well if I won one out of 10!

I can't emphasize this point strongly enough, because I think it goes
straight to the issue of safeguarding our credibility. There may be some
specific lapses that occurred in some of the recent cases we've heard
about, and if so, I'm sure you'll be covering those in depth in some of
your workshops.

But my point is a much broader one: You are the final gatekeeper, and
your job is to ask questions and raise the red flags. If you don't, for
whatever reason, who do you think IS going to ask those questions? Too
often, as you and I both know, the answer is NOBODY. And so quality
suffers, readers are ill-served and the paper starts becoming a mash of
mush.

So you've GOT to persevere, you've GOT to ask the tough, unpopular
questions; and if the emperor isn't wearing any clothes, you've GOT to
tell him, because you're the last line of defense, and that carries an
awesome responsibility.

And what if somebody calls you a nitpicker? You look 'em right in the
eye and say, "That's my job." Along with that, you have to accept that
nitpickers get criticized, so don't be defensive about it. A certain
amount of criticism just goes with the territory.

The best defense against nitpicking criticism is preserving the balance
between minutiae and the big picture. A great copy editor focuses on
both. It's easy to take refuge in details and spend your time being a
grammarian. But copy editors who are only nitpickers aren't doing the
whole job, and they give the rest of you a bad name. Don't be afraid to
pick nits, but if you catch major errors and raise thoughtful,
substantive questions, all the nits you pick along the way will pale in
comparison.
    And while you're doing all this other stuff, don't forget to read. Read
voraciously. Read your own paper cover to cover. Read the competition.
Read the best papers around the country. Read magazines, journals,
fiction, non-fiction. Read great writing wherever you find it. You can't
know enough!

But even after you've done all this and been to every seminar ever
offered at API, Poynter and any place else you can think of, are you
guaranteed to be an effective copy editor? NO. That depends on building
respect for you and your craft.

Obviously, one key to building respect is to improve your performance by
building your knowledge. But the other and equally important key is by
building relationships.

Your role is often an adversarial one. Your job, essentially, is to
raise questions about other people's work. Not only that, you are coming
from an emotionally detached perspective. You haven't been involved in
the excitement and emotion of gathering the news and writing it. All you
know is what you see on that impersonal computer screen.

All of this is good, to a point. The system is set up that way
intentionally so copy editors can take a truly fresh and objective look
at stories. But what you also have to remember is that the reporters and
assigning editors you'll be questioning will be anything but emotionally
detached about their stories. And you'll often be questioning their work
on deadline, when fuses tend to be short anyway.

So to be effective, you've got to be able to raise questions that may be
embarrassing or may go to the very heart of the story and yet do it in
such a way that you don't start a nuclear war every night. You can't win
debates with shouting matches. You win them by marshalling your facts
and presenting them thoughtfully, calmly, reasonably and quickly.

You need to  develop relationships outside the copy desk with reporters,
editors, photographers and artists. Most reporters love to talk about
their work. So do assigning editors. Find ways to approach them and get
to know them personally. Go out for a beer after work or seek them out
at staff parties or in the cafeteria. Whatever you do, find ways to
develop relationships with these people so that when conflicts arise in
the heat of deadline, you're not a nameless, faceless, clueless copy
editor but a thoughtful professional with keen insights and valid
opinions.

If you want more respect in the newsroom, you've got to earn it, and
you're going to have to go out of your way to do that. One way NOT to do
it is to do what we've done many times over the years, and that's to
come across as a bunch of crazy, nitpicking loonies who care only about
the difference between "that" and "which."

Also, remember this: The least effective copy editor establishes the
reputation of the desk. If other people tend to stereotype copy editors
as a bunch of whining nitpickers -- and they often do -- and somebody on
your desk is acting like a whining nitpicker, then guess what -- you're
all a bunch of whining nitpickers!

So you've got to figure out how to talk to your colleagues who behave in
ways that paint an unflattering picture of copy editors,because we all
know that there are many people who want to believe that that picture is
true.

And as you try to do all of these things and write wonderful headlines
and save the paper from libel and factual errors and make deadline at
the same time, never lose sight of this -- you have one of the greatest
jobs in the world!

I always thought that anybody with a brain could do this job, but the
real test is whether you can do it well under pressure. Can you write
the Page One lead head in 30 seconds? Can you make a good trim on a
sensitive story with three people looking over your shoulder and the
slot yelling for you to turn it loose? Only the best can, and it's a
great feeling to know you're one of them.

Thank you very much. Now, I've learned that when you speak after dinner,
you should stop before people fall asleep and start falling out of their
chairs. So I'm going to stop talking TO you, but I'll be glad to talk
WITH you a while longer if anyone would like to ask any questions.

[Waller concluded with a question-and-answer session of about 15
minutes.]