For Scribendi’s regular editing and proofreading services, it’s important to remember that editors should never add or delete actual content.

Content decisions are always the responsibility of the author. As editors, we don’t want to overstep our authority. We can make direct language changes, but we shouldn’t make direct content changes. So, with regard to language revisions, we may have to move, replace, add, or delete words or phrases to deal with grammatical errors, empty verbiage, redundancies in the text, and missing or extraneous words. We want to ensure that the text is correct and clear and that it flows naturally and has an appropriate tone, style, and voice. This is all fine and necessary. What we want to avoid is changing the content of the work.

By content, then, we refer to any idea, thought, fact, argument, evidence, statement, belief, or digression that is part of the document. Choices about such content are the author’s to make, though of course as editors we can (and should) help authors with such decisions. However, this help must be provided through critical commentary rather than through changes directly implemented in the text. For example, if an author writes a digression that seems to us pointless and distracting, we can’t simply delete it. The digression should be revised as carefully as any other element of the text, and we can then provide a comment indicating (in a polite and friendly manner, of course) that the document would benefit from the deletion of this digression, and we can then explain why this deletion would be beneficial.

If an addition or deletion would be beneficial to the document, it must be suggested in a comment (even if it might seem simpler to make the change ourselves). The work is the author’s, and we want to ensure that it remains the author’s work. If we don’t want them to make the wrong choice, we have to be convincing in helping them to find the right choice.

There are a couple instances of this policy that also apply to citations and references. Outside our specialized Merudio Reference Formatting service, there are two key rules to remember for regular Scribendi services. First, we don't research and add missing information to references. If a reference is missing something (e.g., a volume number or city of publication), please provide a comment and indicate the missing information to the author. It's the author's responsibility to add missing information. Second, we don't change documents from an author/date referencing system to a numbered (footnote or endnote) referencing system or vice versa. Please note that it's fine to change from one author date style to another author/date style (e.g., from MLA to APA) or from one numbered style to another numbered style (e.g., from Vancouver to IEEE), just not between author/date and numbered systems (e.g., from APA to IEEE or from Vancouver to MLA). So, we can change between styles but not between systems (except in Merudio Reference Formatting).

Unless there is a special situation or special service that requires our direct help with content, please remember the simple rule: do not add or delete content. Suggest away, of course, but keep your itchy trigger finger holstered.

Last Updated: 09/09/2022