captions
of course the perfect picture does not need a caption. Back in the real world, avoid cliche-ridden kickers, but do not be too prosaic; there is room for wit, where appropriate. Do not state the obvious: it insults both photographer and reader. And above all, make it relevant to the story.
Captions take a full point.

On single-column mugshots, use the surname only at the beginning followed by a colon. Mandelson: tipped for a comeback. NB: lower case after colon.

On all other news captions there should be white space between the words and the photographer's credit, which is set right (use alt-tab to achieve this). The credit should include both name and agency. On multi-line single column captions, this is set ragged right, no hyphens. Thus: Photograph by John Brilliant/Magnum. For wire pictures without a byline, drop 'photograph by' and use only the agency.

(Review and magazines have their own style on this. Consult chief subs )

cartel
avoid calling a group of companies a cartel unless it is one

CD-rom

cellphone
prefer mobile phone

Census
For detailed breakdown of UK population statistics, use www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/

Centres for Disease Control
not singular, and not the American spelling

Cephalonia
eschew the variations

champagne
see wines

chatroom
one word: also online

Chekhov

chicken tikka masala

childcare and childminder

Christie's
the auction house;
the holding company has no apostrophe

CIA
no need to spell out on first mention

City
cap for the City of London, lc for all other cities

CJD
Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease

Coca-Cola

Coke
when short for Coca-Cola;
coke (lc) is short for smokeless fuel and cocaine

Cold War
capped

colons
use before quotes when the quote could stand on its own as a sentence. He said: 'You'll never take me alive.'

commas
no commas around non-removable names. 'The author, Elmore Leonard, was speaking in London yesterday', means there is only one author in the world. No bad thing if it was Elmore Leonard, perhaps

companies
are always singular

comprise
means to consist of 'Comprise of' is wrong

CFC
chlorofluorocarbon

compare to/with
The former means liken to, the latter means make a comparison: so unless you are specifically likening someone or something to someone or something else, use compare with

compass points
are all lc: north, south, the south west, north east England; the same applies to geopolitical areas: the west, western Europe, far east, south east Asia, central America etc.
Exception: Middle East.
NB no hyphens in any of these. Newcastle is not a city in the north east. Add '...of England' to avoid enraging Aberdonian readers and Scots on the revise desk

Consumers' Association

contractions
- I'm, isn't, he's etc - are OK in direct quotes but otherwise should be used sparingly. They also hyphenate badly at the end of lines. Never leave a loose -n't at the beginning of a line. To push words over, use the soft hyphen (Command-hyphen) rather then the soft return (shift-return). In fact, avoid the soft return unless it's absolutely necessary

coruscating
means sparkling, or emitting flashes of light; 'a coruscating attack on Michael Howard' is meaningless.
The writer means 'excoriating'

co-operation
takes hyphen

counties
follow Bartholomew's Gazetteer

countries
pronoun pref. it

Cracow
it's Krakow: see places

crescendo
a gradual increase in loudness or intensity; musically or figuratively, it is the build-up to a climax, not the climax itself. Thus, nothing can reach a crescendo

cri du coeur
not 'de coeur'

cross-references
at end of stories: set left in Text Bell Bold and short enough to fit into single line
Mortgage panic, page 21

If two or more x-refs set on separate lines:
Mortgage panic, page 21
Chancellor's warning, page 25

At the end of briefs, or in captions, they should be set in same style but run on in brackets thus ... final decision. (Sleepy town's war, page 8)

cruise missile

currency
foreign money should, where practicable, be expressed in sterling, with the exception of American $ when used in an American context. When talking about a named currency (for example, the yen), lower case for all. Where stories need to use local currency, give an indication of how much it is in brackets at first mention, eg: They are paid seven pesos (10p) for a long subbing shift.

currency abbreviations
· dollar: $ will be taken to refer to the US dollar, use A$ for Australian dollars, C$ for Canadian, HK$ for Hong Kong
· Yen: spell out after figure
· All others, spell out the name of the currency, lower case.
The 'eurozone' is also lower case

currently
prefer now

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