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Cleans, tightens, and restructures raw interview transcripts for publication — removing filler, condensing repetition, and preserving authentic voice. Useful for producing Q&A or narrative pieces from interview recordings.
How this skill is triggered — by the user, by Claude, or both
Slash command
/autopunk-media-skills:interview-transcript-editorThe summary Claude sees in its skill listing — used to decide when to auto-load this skill
Cleans, tightens, and restructures a raw interview transcript for publication — removing false starts and filler, condensing repetition, reordering for narrative flow, and preserving the subject's authentic voice.
Cleans, tightens, and restructures a raw interview transcript for publication — removing false starts and filler, condensing repetition, reordering for narrative flow, and preserving the subject's authentic voice.
Required: The raw transcript or the section you want edited; the publication format (full Q&A, excerpts within a narrative piece, pull-quote selection, or summary with quotes); approximate target word count or space available. Optional: The publication and its style; which sections or answers you consider essential (must-keep material); the subject's identity type (expert, public figure, affected individual, whistleblower — this affects how aggressively to edit); whether the subject has approval rights over the edited transcript.
Edited transcript in Q&A format with interviewer questions marked Q: and subject answers marked A:. A brief editorial notes section at the end flags: any passages where editing required an editorial judgment (paraphrase risk), any passages that were cut in full with one-sentence explanation, and any answers where the meaning felt unclear in the original and the edit made a specific choice. Target word count honored. No changes to the subject's word choices — only removal and compression. Output ends with a "Next Step" note: whether to send for subject approval, which editorial note to review first, and whether to run fact-check-prompt on factual claims in the answers.
Raw transcript excerpt (1,050 words → target 480 words): Format: Q&A for publication Subject: A materials scientist who developed a biodegradable packaging alternative to single-use plastic
Q: Can you describe what your material actually is? Like, how would you explain it to someone who doesn't have a science background?
A: Yeah, so, um, the — it's basically, at its core, it's a composite material. We're combining — we take plant-based fibers, so these are agricultural waste streams, things that would otherwise be composted or just discarded — and we're combining them with a biopolymer matrix. And the biopolymer we use is derived from, it's a bacterial fermentation process. So you grow specific bacteria, they produce this polymer as a byproduct, and you harvest that. And then when you combine those two things together in the right proportions, and there's a lot of work that went into figuring out what "the right proportions" are, you get a material that has — that has comparable mechanical properties to the plastics we're trying to replace, but that will fully degrade in a soil environment within, we're measuring 18 to 24 months, which compared to, you know, standard petroleum-based plastics, that's — that's a dramatic improvement.
Q: What's the thing that took the longest to figure out?
A: Oh, that's — the mechanical properties question was hard. Because there's this fundamental tension that we kept running into — the more degradable you make something, generally speaking, the less structurally stable it is under the conditions it needs to perform under. So if you're packaging food, you need moisture resistance, you need to handle some compressive load, you can't have it just softening in a humid environment. And making the material more moisture-resistant tends to mean making it less biodegradable. So it's — you're constantly pulling in opposite directions. We spent — I'd say two, two and a half years just on that one question, on the moisture barrier problem. And the solution we landed on was actually — it came from an unexpected place, it came from looking at how certain seed coatings in plants work, because they have this same challenge, right, they need to protect the seed until germination and then fully break down, and nature has a pretty elegant solution to that. So we borrowed from that.
Q: Are you at a stage where this is commercially viable?
A: We think so, yes. We've been — we've been working with three packaging manufacturers over the last year on pilot programs. And the early results are — they're encouraging. The cost per unit is still higher than conventional plastic, I'm not going to pretend otherwise, it's about 30 to 40% higher right now at current production volumes. But what we're seeing — and this is the part that matters for the commercial question — is that the cost differential narrows significantly at scale. So when we model this at the production volumes these manufacturers would need to fully transition, the gap closes to somewhere between 8 and 15%. Which is in a range that several brands we've talked to have said they can absorb, particularly given the regulatory environment around single-use plastics in a number of markets.
Edited Transcript
Q: How would you describe your material to someone without a science background?
A: At its core, it's a composite material. We take plant-based fibers — agricultural waste streams that would otherwise be discarded — and combine them with a biopolymer derived from a bacterial fermentation process. When you combine those two things in the right proportions, you get a material with mechanical properties comparable to the plastics we're trying to replace, but one that fully degrades in a soil environment within 18 to 24 months. Compared to standard petroleum-based plastics, that's a dramatic improvement.
Q: What took the longest to solve?
A: The mechanical properties question. There's a fundamental tension: the more degradable you make something, generally, the less structurally stable it is under the conditions it needs to perform in. If you're packaging food, you need moisture resistance — and making a material more moisture-resistant tends to make it less biodegradable. You're constantly pulling in opposite directions. We spent two and a half years on the moisture barrier problem alone. The solution came from an unexpected place — we looked at how certain seed coatings in plants work. They have the same challenge: protect the seed until germination, then fully break down. Nature has a pretty elegant solution to that. We borrowed from it.
Q: Is this commercially viable?
A: We think so. We've been working with three packaging manufacturers over the last year on pilot programs. The cost per unit is still higher than conventional plastic — about 30 to 40% higher at current production volumes, I'm not going to pretend otherwise. But the cost differential narrows significantly at scale. When we model this at the volumes these manufacturers would need to fully transition, the gap closes to 8 to 15%. Several brands we've talked to have said they can absorb that range, particularly given the regulatory environment around single-use plastics in a number of markets.
Editorial Notes
npx claudepluginhub ur-grue/autopunk-media-skills --plugin autopunk-media-skillsCleans raw interview transcripts into polished Q&A format by removing filler words, fixing speaker labels, standardising punctuation, and optionally adding timestamps.
Mechanically cleans raw dictation transcripts into editable drafts: removes fillers/false starts, restores punctuation/paragraphs, flags transcription errors without editing content or voice.
Summarizes customer interview transcripts into markdown template with JTBD, satisfaction signals, key insights, and action items for product discovery.