Column Inches and Editorial Content
Column inches are also used as an ad-hoc estimate of the importance of a news story and are also used to tell how much copy a reporter should write. This harks back to the paste up days, when in fact newspaper stories used to be printed on long strips of paper that were 1 column wide. The length would vary based on how long the story was.
The software used in most present-day newsrooms still measures column inches to give reporters and editors an estimate on how much space a story will take up on a page. Reporters usually refer to story lengths in inches, which actually refers to how many column inches a story takes up. Although it varies, it is generally agreed upon that there are 25-35 words in a column inch.
Newsroom staffers also measure items such as photographs and infographics using column inches.
Read more about this topic: Column Inch
Famous quotes containing the words column, inches, editorial and/or content:
“Averageness is a quality we must put up with. Men march toward civilization in column formation, and by the time the van has learned to admire the masters the rear is drawing reluctantly away from the totem pole.”
—Frank Moore Colby (1865–1925)
“A man finds room in the few square inches of the face for the traits of all his ancestors; for the expression of all his history, and his wants.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I have been in the editorial business going on fourteen years, and it is the first time I ever heard of a man’s having to know anything in order to edit a newspaper.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“I am as content to die for God’s eternal truth on the scaffold as in any other way.”
—John Brown (1800–1859)