LOL Y'all are not helping my spelling problem. I play Scrabble with my son and he has many an opportunity to look at the word I just put down and say, "Really, Mom?" I think it's my desire to make points that causes me to believe that a "z" can fit in anywhere an "s" usually would.
So when I think of what an Editor (or Proofreader) does, I think of spelling, punctuation, grammar, verb tense/subject agreement, etc. I don't really think of proofing for accuracy or continuity or anachronisms. It's not that I disagree that's what might be involved, I just never thought of anyone reviewing a story for those components (except perhaps technical journals or scientific papers.) It never occurred to me. Can you imagine someone unraveling the twists & turns of an Agatha Christie novel?
I think that problem is becoming more apparent because of the ease with which an author can get a book in print today. Anyone who can use a computer can have a book printed for Kindle, and Amazon sells books that are printed on demand now, meaning that no editing is required in order to get a book published. Of course, that doesn't mean an author should bring his book to print without editing. On the positive side, it means that we can read books that would have never found their way into print otherwise, but on the negative side, some of them aren't worth reading.
What stinks about it is that many of us here improved our vocabulary and our writing skills and many other things by what we've read throughout our lives. When my mother died, the only object I wanted from her house was my childhood ABCs book where "X is for Xerxes," not "x-ray" or "xylophone." Vocabulary and grammar and style and plot depth are all part of our education. I'm not sure which is the horse and which is the cart regarding culture and communication, but communication can take the lead. Hopefully it leads in the right direction. Now I wonder if there are standards that are met in order to hold oneself out as being an editor.
What's a Xerxes? My grammar corrector just informed me that I should put "a" before Xerxes instead of "an". I still think it should be "an" but what do I know. I'm just a poor simple country girl.
A Persian ruler around 475B.C. Prominent character in the Book of Esther. I know little about history, and only know of Xerxes because of the letter "x" and the Book of Esther.
I think much of the problem is that a lot of modern Kindle stuff is written by AI. and little if any editing or proofreading is done. I am reading a series of quirky books now that specifically state that no part of the books are written by artificial intelligence.