The Morning News

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Currently: solving the world’s ills, over drinks
Today’s Feature: “Ladies First” by Eric Feezell
Digest: “Video Digest” by Meave Gallagher
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Letters for publication in The Morning News should be emailed to letters@themorningnews.org. Letters must be exclusive to The Morning News, and may be edited for length. Authors will not be contacted if their letter is published. All letters must be signed. No attachments, please. We value your correspondence.

Edited by Kate Schlegel

Reader Mail

February 07, 2008
Dear editors,

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t limited space for headlines the only reason newspapers use commas in place of “and’? If so, a question: Web sites aren’t subject to the same space restrictions, so why do you persist in using them in your daily headlines? It really annoys me.

Yours truly,
Molly Bennett
Pedant General

Andrew Womack responds…

Molly:

(Note my use of a colon rather than a comma in the salutation.)

In fact, our space in the headlines is more limited than you might think. We try to maximize the readability of the homepage headlines column by keeping the number of lines any single headline spans to a minimum. And we do that by aiming for an economy of characters in each headline. Thus, we sometimes use commas in place of “and”—by doing so, we shave off three characters.

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MORE MAIL


TODAY’S FEATURE

Ladies First

Experts answer what they know. The Non-Expert answers anything. This week ERIC FEEZELL solves the origins of “Mrs.,” and presents a new nomenclature to fill the gender gap, once and for all.

PURE GIBBERISH

My Father Speaks Another Language

Sarah Hepola listens, her mother translates.

NEWSLETTER

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DIGEST

Video Digest

May 16 | The government is watching you right now. Don’t believe it? Meave Gallagher has the video to p…

» Mp3 Digest, May 14
» Book Digest, May 12