Quote:
Originally Posted by bill_mchale
4. Lets be honest, a lot of the copy editing can be done by automated computer programs these days.. and considering the number of mistakes I see in many modern novels, many publishing companies seem to end copy editing with the computer program.
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A computer program
cannot copyedit a book. How would it know whether a comma should be inserted or removed, for example? A computer program
can help with copyediting, especially find and replace for consistency and spell checking, but as Bill noted, too many publishers do seem to end the copyediting with the computer program and the poor results are obvious.
A skilled, competent copyeditor (live person) is not inexpensive. Sadly, publishers often hire poorly skilled people who charge very little for their service to copyedit books in an effort to save money. And many people believe that because they read books and can spot an error or two that they are great editors.