What’s the Best Way to Correct a Mistake?

Mistakes are good, they help us grow.
They show us what we need to know.
So when you make mistakes, don't cry.
You'll get better if you try.

My 10-year-old daughter wrote me this when she was in kindergarten and I still have it hanging in my office. It's a great reminder that "to err is human."

I've used this blog to discuss how, thanks to the Web and the fact that everyone is now a publisher, editorial, sales, circulation, art, production and management need to embrace what those in the print world have dubbed e-media. With blogs, Tweets and Facebook accounts, typos, mis-quotes and just plain old mistakes have taken on a whole new meaning.

So what's the best way to correct a mistake online? In print, the de facto method is to write a correction in the next issue, but online you can simply open a file back up, and with a couple of keystrokes one's screw-up is a thing of the past. I'll admit that I've done it before and even once needed to pull an entire post down from this site. Try doing that in a magazine!

Two better examples I've seen on how to handle online corrections include using a strikethrough or a clear call-out box.

I'm not sure there's a standard for the Web like there is in print, but I think there should be.