The filler columns are churned out in a matter of minutes with no loftier goal than meeting a deadline and filling up space-meaning that columnists will often resort to using the same words or phrase again and again and again and again and again.
Rather than doing any original writing, slothful columnists will rely on so-called experts to supply them with quotes to fill up space, experts say.
“They’ll often quote people you’ve never heard of,” says Harold Crimmins, an expert on filler columns. “It’s pretty shameless.”
The typical filler column is often written months earlier, in the dead of winter, but the writer will later plug in one cursory reference to current events, such as the Gary Condit scandal, to disguise this fact.
In order to fill up space even faster, Crimmins says, the lazy beach-bound columnist will compose his summer filler columns with short paragraphs.
Many of these paragraphs will be as short as one sentence, he says.
“Or shorter,” he adds.
There are other telltale signs a reader can look for when trying to determine whether a writer has, in fact, filed a so-called filler column, says Crimmins.
One of these is a tendency to repeat information that the reader has already read earlier in the article. Columnists will even stoop so low as to use the same quote twice. “They’ll often quote people you’ve never heard of,” Crimmins says.
Another tip-off: The column ends abruptly.
