The Sydney Morning Herald (online)
(January 16 2002)
Here is a portion of the "front page" of the Sydney Morning Herald online on the morning of Wednesday 16 January 2002.
SMH online 16/1/02 11am
http://www.smh.com.au 16/1/02 - 11:00am
So... what's the problem here?
"Severe storms clobber coast"
"...wind and rain clobbered Sydney..."
The SMH is supposed to be a "quality" broadsheet.
Any dictionary will tell you that "clobber" is colloquial, and not appropriate in this context.
OK. Maybe I am too rigid, unyielding and old-fashioned. Perhaps the standards for written expression are changing. Maybe colloquialisms are appropriate in this context.

What about this, then:

SMH 16/1/02 animated text http://www.smh.com.au 16/1/02 - 11:00am (detail)

"...destoying"? ...and that extra "had"?

I'm in favour of work experience as much as anybody. I think its marvellous that the SMH would let junior apprentices type up the copy for the online edition headlines.
...but...
Shouldn't there be a sub-editor, or a proofreader or at least an online spell-checker?

I guess pots shouldn't call kettles black
...but (hehehe) I can't wait for their next editorial about falling standards in public education.

I wouldn't permit any of the above mistakes to go uncorrected in my students' work...

By 11am the article in question had lost "lead" article status. The bloopers remained uncorrected.
SMH online 16/1/02 11am http://www.smh.com.au 16/1/02 - 1:00pm

By 3pm it was no longer a headline. "Destoying" and the extra "had" were gone, but they still hadn't clobbered the "clobber".

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