---
name: editing-ai-drafts
description: Use when you have a model-generated draft that reads fine sentence by sentence but is not worth publishing as it stands.
---

# Edit an AI Draft Into Something Publishable

AI drafts fail in ways that normal copy editing does not catch, because the prose is grammatical and confident. The characteristic defects are structural: hedged claims, invented specifics, symmetrical sections that give equal weight to unequal things, and a summary paragraph restating what was just said. Line editing makes these smoother without removing them. You need a different pass order - cut structure first, verify facts second, and only then edit sentences.

## What you need first

- the draft and the prompt or brief that produced it
- a source you can check every numeric claim against
- a sample of your own previously published pages for voice

## Method

1. Delete the introduction and the conclusion before reading anything else. AI intros restate the title and AI conclusions restate the body; in most drafts the real opening is paragraph three.
2. Check whether sections are equally long. Uniform section length is a tell that the model padded the thin ones - collapse or cut any section that exists only for symmetry.
3. Flag every specific: numbers, percentages, dates, tool names, study references. Treat each as unverified until checked, including plausible round figures, which are the ones most often fabricated.
4. Strike hedges that carry no information - "can vary", "it depends on your needs", "may or may not". Either replace with the actual condition that decides it, or delete the sentence.
5. Search for list-of-three constructions and tricolon rhythm. Models overproduce these; breaking a few into uneven forms removes most of the machine cadence without a rewrite.
6. Add one thing the model could not know - a decision you made, a client outcome, a number from your own data - and put it above the fold, not in a closing note.

## What this produces

A shorter draft with every specific verified, structural padding removed, and at least one first-hand element.

## Where this goes wrong

- Running the draft through a humanising tool or a second model, which changes wording while leaving the fabricated specifics and hollow structure intact
- Editing sentences before cutting sections, so effort is spent polishing paragraphs that should not exist
- Trusting a citation because the model gave a URL - check the URL resolves and says what the draft claims it says

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From the QuQi skill library - https://www.quqi.io/skills/editing-ai-drafts