Broadcast Writing Style

• Begin sentences with subjects whenever possible so listeners can identify the actor
• Avoid introductory clauses that might confuse or distract listeners
• Use active voice and present tense, except to vary your language
• Sentence fragments are satisfactory: Like this. "Chocolate chip. That's America's favorite kind of cookie, according to a poll...."
• Attribute information to the source at the beginning of a story
• Avoid unnecessary descriptions, appositives, details.
• Beware of the names of unknowns: Describe people by their position or occupation first if the person's name isn't recognized widely.
• Don't abbreviate, even commonly known terms.

Numbers

• Spell out all numbers through eleven; use figures for 12-999 (11 might be misread as two ones)
• Use figures in combination with thousands, millions, billions
• Round off numbers unless precision is essential: "5,100 feet" is close enough to a "mile" in most instances.
• Avoid figures like 2,603,000. If required: spell out: two milliion, 603 thousand. Or two point six billion.
• Spell out dollars: Say one (b) billion, 500 (m) million dollars (not $1.5 billion). Insert parenthetical flags to help readers correctly read millions, billions.
• Spell out fractions: seven-eighths, but 19-hundredths of a second
• Say eight point six; December seventh (less than eleven), February 16th (more than eleven), the years 19-41 and 2000.
• Use figures for years (1999), time of day (2 p.m.) simple street addresses, financial stories, and most sports stories.
• Split potentially awkward addresses (or other numbers) with hyphens: 60-0-4 Hite Street.
• Whenever the broadcaster might be confused, spell out figures.

• Avoid needless quotes
• Don't read "quote, unquote"
• Avoid regional slang, references, dialect and colloquialisms that might not be understood by your audience.

• Use a dash to indicate abbreviated words that should be spoken that way: F-B-I, U-S-Senate, C-S-U, W-G-N Radio, N-double A-C-P.
• Abbreviated words spoken as a single words use no dashes: NASA, NATO. DOS.

• Provide phonetic spellings for unusual or difficult to pronounce names. Include these "pronouncers" every time.
• Spell difficult-to-pronounce words correctly, then enclose the pronouncer in parentheses: Mackinac (MAK-ih-naw) Island, Michigan
• Common pronouncers are:
  • A: ah (father, arm), a (bat, apple), aw (raw, talk), ay (fate, ace)
  • E: ee (feet, tea), eh (get, bed), ew (few)
  • I: eye (time, ice), ee (machine,), ih (pit, middle)
  • O: oh (note, oval), ah (hot), aw (fought), oo (food, two), u (foot), ow (how, clout)
  • U: ew (mule, hue), oo (rule, fume), u (put, curl), uh (shut, pull)
  • Consonants: g (got), j (general), k (keep, cat), ch (chair, butcher), sh (machine, shut), z (disease, visit)

  Graphics/Titles

• When using supers (supertitles) or billboards in a script, write out the copy exactly as it should appear.
• For ease of reading: Use no more than five words in a line, and no more than five lines on the screen. (Stations should vary the size and/or color to enhance readability.)