Glossary
Copytaker
A copytaker was a typist in a newspaper office who took down stories that reporters dictated over the telephone. The Collins English Dictionary defines the role this way, and it predates the computer-based filing that replaced it.
Updated October 17, 20262 cited facts, each traced to its source
Also called copy taker.
A copytaker was a typist in a newspaper office who took down stories that reporters dictated over the telephone. The Collins English Dictionary defines the role as a person employed to type reports as journalists dictate them over the telephone 1. The word is British in origin and is marked as used mainly in newspaper offices.
Phoned-in copy came before computers
Before reporters could file from the field by computer, they often phoned their notes in. Wikipedia's entry on the rewrite man describes the pre-computer newsroom: reporters on deadline would telephone into the newsroom and dictate their notes to an editor 2. The copytaker's job was to turn that spoken copy into typed text so the newsroom could work with it. The phone call was the reporter's dictation, and the copytaker was the person who typed it.
The copytaker is the human form of dictation
Read this way, a copytaker is an early version of what dictation software does today. Both take spoken words and produce typed text. The difference is that the copytaker was a person who typed while listening, while modern software does the transcription itself and leaves the speaker to review the result. Our overview of the history of dictation places this role in a longer sequence of methods.
Why the role matters to people who dictate today
The copytaker shows the basic trade-off of dictation. Speaking is quick for the author, but the text still has to be checked. A copytaker who misheard a name or a figure produced an error that the newsroom had to catch. Modern dictation has the same risk, so check names, numbers and quotes before you publish. For writers who dictate their drafts, see our guide to dictation for journalists and content creators.
Related roles
The scopist edits transcripts in court work, a related step that also checks spoken words against a written record. The transcriptionist types dictation from recordings in medical and legal settings. Both are closer to the copytaker's job than to a reporter's, because each turns speech into text that someone else will use.
Evidence
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Related terms
- Dictation for Work: Doctors, Lawyers, Writers, StudentsThe topic this term belongs to
- Back-end speech recognitionBack-end speech recognition is a workflow in which the dictated audio is recognized and then edited by someone else, usually a transcriptionist, before it is signed. Its main trade-off is the cost and time of the second pass against the writer's own editing effort.
- Dictation templateA dictation template is a block of text saved under a short spoken phrase, so one phrase inserts the whole block. Dragon calls these auto-texts, and Microsoft's Dragon Medical One guide documents the command that creates one from selected text.
- Electronic health record (EHR)An electronic health record (EHR) is a digital record of a patient's health information, built up over time from visits across care settings. The federal eCQI glossary also calls it an electronic medical record (EMR), and it is where dictated and typed notes end up.
- Front-end speech recognitionFront-end speech recognition is a workflow in which the person who dictates also reviews, corrects and signs the text, instead of passing the audio to someone else. The term is most common in radiology, where it is set against back-end transcription.
- Medical scribeA medical scribe is a person, or more recently an AI tool, that records what happens in a clinical visit and writes it into the chart so the clinician can focus on the patient. The clinician remains responsible for the note and must check and sign it.
- Pajama timePajama time is the record-keeping that clinicians finish after their clinic day ends, often at home in the evening. A 2017 study of primary care clinicians measured 86 minutes of EHR work per weekday after clinic hours.
- Registered Healthcare Documentation Specialist (RHDS)The Registered Healthcare Documentation Specialist (RHDS) is a voluntary credential from AHDI for people who create healthcare documentation. It is awarded after an exam of 120 questions, and it is a prerequisite for the CHDS.
- ScopistA scopist edits the transcripts of official proceedings that court reporters create. Scopists are typically paid by the page, starting from $1.00 to $1.50 per page, and the role is also called transcript editor.
- SOAP noteA SOAP note is a structured clinical note with four parts: Subjective, Objective, Assessment and Plan. The format was developed by Larry Weed, and a StatPearls reference article describes it as a widely used documentation method for clinicians.
- Transcription line rateA transcription line is a unit of 65 characters, and the line count is the number of such units in a document. The transcription line rate is the price paid for each line, so the unit controls how transcribed work is measured.