Quick headline tip

This is not a new one, but worth repeating.

Many of the participants at Saturday's meeting of the American Copy Editors Society Southeast chapter said that when they're looking for headline ideas, they turn to imdb.com, the Internet Movie Database.

Search on the word central to your story, and you may well come up with a useful pop culture reference that will bring the headline to life.

Obviously, this has to be used with some care -- not recommended for a lot of hard news heds and easy to become cheesy. But as one person noted, so much of our society is based on pop-culture references that working a phrase off one can be a way to covey a lot of information in a tight count.

ACES' Southeast chapter, the group's charter chapter, is revitalizing. It needs people committed to improving this craft. Interested? E-mail Holly Kerfoot.