The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1893-10-10
RAPID TYPESETTING.
AN INVENTION THAT WILL REVOLU-
TloNlzE NEWSPAPER WORK.

Machine Is Destined to Make In All Big
Newspaper ofices-oue Writer Tries an
,,.
1t happens that / have very decided ideas
about the future of mechanical typesetting
Originally disbelievera and u scofIer. l have
become convert. The machine is with us
to stay. 1t has come Just as came the cot
ton gin. Any device that will reduce the
cost of the production of a manufactured
article 25 per cent cannot be ignored. The
newspaper is a manufactured article. Type
setting by machinery does reduce the cost
of its production at least 80 per cent There
fore the machine is the life preserver of the
modern nevspaper.
With the perfection of the printing ma
chine came the invention of the Typewriter,
and while their relation is not obvious at
first there is no doubt that their interde-
nendence can he shown and that the suc-
cess of the tvpewriter has FASTENED the per-
lection of the typesetting machine.
We can all remember how crude were
the first typewriting machines; how mac
curate their alignment and how slow their
production of copy. Today no we'll ap-
pointed newspaper or lawyers office is com
plete without them. Many successful cor
respondents and special writers do their
own work wholly by dictation directly to
the typewriter. So great is the speed of the
expert operator today that he or she can
readily keep pace with the average rate of
speaking. The typewriter has become
great source of comfort to the copy reader
and editor. Bad English is more readily
detected, proper names are more accurately
put in type from the printed page, and the
general result is more satisfactory to both
the writer and the reader of the paper
The theory upon which the copy reading
desk exists in every newspaper Office is that
it is for the purpose of making matter in
tended for publication more readable and
more concise, but, above all, of purging it
of libelous and indicate matter and bad
English
1t is matter of sincere modification to
the experienced writer upon the newspaper
press to feel that the average copy reader
is a copy butcher While not entirely to
blame for this, because he is instructed by
his superior to read for space" the haste
under which the work generally has to be
performed does not initiate in favor of nice
distinctions in the use of words, in the
turning of phrases or in the selection of
subheads. Very much-ah too often-the
individuality of the writer is destroyed, and
the plan upon which he or she constructed
the account of disaster, a murder or a
town meeting is utterly eradicated
/ can remember to have heard in The
Tribune office during the days of Horace
Greeley humiliating rebukes administered
to reporters upon it's staff who ventured to
cleverly turn phrase or to be unduly fa-
miliar with an adjective. In those days of
the blue pencil the copy readers broke
hearts and slashed manuscript, never stop
ping to consider that they were destroying
instead of creating capable newspaper re-
porters and correspondents
Looking back over an experience of near
ly quarter of century in New York, !
cannot recall single clever literary man
who endured that harsh schooling for three
or four years whose love of his work sur
vived. The blue pencil with a mere car
penter behind it, is the destroyer of style,
the dissipator of ambition.
The typesetting machine already looms
up as valuable coadjutor of the working
newspaper man-whether he be reporter
editor or special writer. The compactness
of the typesetting machine of today; the
possibility of running it with a small dyna.
mo and jet of gas; the fact that one man
can do the work of four and can produce
type in columns ready for use with nearly
the same rapidity that the expert typewrit-
er can place words in row upon blank pa.
per, suggest that the writer talk directly to
the compositor.
Before many years l confidently expect
to see the typesettinS machine, with the ex
pert compositor behind it, take place al
the right hand of every writing editor:
desk in every newspaper office in this coun
try.
The manual drudgery of composition i:
already relieved by the Introduction of the
stenographer and typewriter, but at crit
ical hours OF the night, when every minute
Is worth saving there Is no reason why de
lay should be suffered by writer who de
sires to turn into copy Ideas that are ready
to flow from his pen upon the white paper
Why longer submit to the tyranny of thu
copy reader? Why shall not each star
reporter hire his typesetting machine JUS
as he already employs his typewriter?
There are many arguments in favor o
this idea.
The writer will be able to exactly fill tn,
there ba .nv .sovarset - ba Xc;lI know II he
fore the article goes into the hands of thu