Comments on: I see typos everywhere

By: Why you’re missing out on great content « She whispers to words

Why you’re missing out on great content « She whispers to words — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:14:35 +0000

[...] to look past the unorthodox spellings and focus on the message instead. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, though. But it’s an ongoing effort so I had to remind myself of it once again. [...]

By: wordwhisperer

wordwhisperer — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 08:11:26 +0000

Hi, Nancy.

I feel honoured that you commented on my blog. And I’ve never heard of McKean’s Law. Thanks for this. I’ll definitely be more careful from now on.

By: Fritinancy

Fritinancy — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 17:58:00 +0000

I’m thrilled to discover this blog (I linked over from Editrix), and especially gratified to read this post. I’m a former copyeditor myself, and I have to make a huge effort to read past typos. (I just read an otherwise interesting comment about the economic bailout in which “lobbyist” was misspelled TWICE as “lobbiest,” and now that’s all I can remember about the comment.)

However, I’m also keenly aware of McKean’s Law, which stipulates that any correction of the speech or writing of others will include at least one spelling, grammatical, or typographical error.

Which leads me to GooseGrade (www.goosegrade.com), another recent discovery. It’s promoted as an application that allows blog readers to correct content. Interesting, no? However, I caught three punctuation errors on the GooseGrade home page–e.g., “We just launched please be helpful and send any errors you find!”

Not reassuring!

By: wordwhisperer

wordwhisperer — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 14:56:30 +0000

theexile, I now know how to edit WordPress blog comments. So feel at ease when you comment here.

But I fully agree with what you said. How difficult is it to write a sentence?

Christina, merci. I’ll have fun with this site.

By: Christina

Christina — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 12:19:29 +0000

I hear you on this one, Joy-Mari. There is probably something to be said for overlooking certain errors to focus on the larger point. But other mistakes trip me up and force me to reread a sentence. Those will continue to irk me because they disrupt my reading.

And as to women24.com, I’ll throw in a guilty pleasure of mine that is laden with errors, sometimes shockingly basic: people.com.

GrammarGuard.org

By: theexile

theexile — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 02:48:31 +0000

I want to come to the defense of writers writing on deadline, or blame it on hurried copy editors, or overly rushed writers, editors and copy editors in a digital age in which immediacy and information is more important than content or even good writing, and yet, I can’t, at least not 100 percent. I’ve worked with too many university-educated writers who don’t know the basics of grammar, who can’t spell, and who really don’t give a damn to feel much sympathy for excessive typos. Sloppiness is sloppiness, and contrary to popular belief, if a sentence is read carefully, the grammar matters, and affects the content, subtly changing meaning.

Of course, now I hope I haven’t made a fool of myself in this hastily written comment and haven’t made any horrible errors. Or that those errors will be forgiven because I rsuehed to opublis this commnt.