EDITOR vs. PUBLISHER

Hello again everyone. Welcome back to the Daily Vitamin!

English students are often not aware that in English the word editor is a false friend.

An editor is: a person who is in charge of the content of a newspaper or magazine, or a particular section of a newspaper or magazine.

A publisher is: a company (or person) that manages and directs the writing, production, and sales of books, magazines, newspapers or computer software. We sometimes refer to a publishing company as a publishing house.

Example 1
The editor of ABC is more conservative than the editor of El País.

Example 2
Oxford University Press is one of the most prestigious publishers of English-teaching materials in the world.

Example 3
Last week I wrote a letter to the editor of the local newspaper and yesterday they published it on page 2; I couldn't believe it!

Notice that publish can also be a verb (Example 3). It means "to include something such as an article (or a letter to the editor) in a magazine or a newspaper" or "to create a lot of copies of a book, newspaper or magazine."

Edit can also be a verb and means "to prepare a document or book for publishing by correcting the mistakes."

Example 4
Before they published my book it needed to be edited.

To get some extra practice, can you come up with your own original sentence for editor and publish? You can post your sentences on one of our social media sites (Facebook or Twitter) and we will give you feedback about your sentence as soon as possible.

Enjoy the rest of your day!