What is non-linear editing?

Linear editing is done tape to tape, so to get to a clip, you have to
move forward or backward through the tape. Non-linear editing is
possible now because of advances in digital video. With non-linear
editing, you can instantly move from one point in video to another in
either direction and final output is usually able to be done without
generational loss in quality.

Computer Generated graphics are also much easier to integrate thanks to
advances in digital technology.

By the way, on That Darned Computer we did employ early linear editing
technology. Even so, it still took 12 of us all week (10 hour days) to
put the half hour (21 minutes) in the can.

Tillman