Aw Grammar Smackdown 08!

[Beans]

I'm sure many people have noticed that in the past few years, with the increase in user-created content on the internet, grammatical errors are spreading faster than a Primary selection rumor. Unfortunately, this site with its well-educated Military Officers and friends has not been immune. It would help all of us in our professional careers and in our personal enrichment to make sure we don't fall victim to this.

I'm not claiming to be an expert, but I'm guessing that I share a few pet peeves with many users of this site. Here are a few errors I have noticed that make me die a little inside every time I read them.

WORD CHOICE:
there / their / they're
to / too
your / you're
a lot / alot
lose / loose
it's / its

If anyone has some useful resources to post or other common errors to point out, I think it'd help us out a lot, and make this site even betterer.

 

[BACONATOR]

spelling mistakes too. Come on people, it's not as if you don't see the red error scribble underneath a word you have incorrectly spelled.

 

[m0tbaillie]

"Internet" is considered a proper noun, these days.

In all seriousness - I fully agree! Nothing pisses me off more than reading "your stupid" on the Internet.

 

[fc2spyguy]

Funny, I usually try to say your stoopid

And red squiggly line? I didn't get that until I went to Mozilla, and will never go back.

Though, the one that really gets me is "there great!" Come on people, haven't you had frosted flakes before?

 

[HeloBubba]

Also, if you are not sure of the proper format of your contraction of choice, spell it out.

So instead of "your stupid" trying to be "you're stupid", type "you are stupid".

 

[Mumbles]

Me fail englilish, thats unpossible!

http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail64.html

 

[IKE]

Maybe you could add a poll to this thread asking people what their favorite misspelled word or mistaken word choice is.

My favorite misspelled word: definate(ly) (I think this is the most commonly misspelled word on the interwebs, seperate might be 2nd)

My favorite mistaken word choice: wear/where

If you want your ideas to be taken seriously, you really should expend the mental effort to write intelligibly.

 

[Lobster]

And red squiggly line? I didn't get that until I went to Mozilla

If you don't have the red squiggly line copy and paste into Microsoft Word always works.

 

[SemperGumbi]

If you think this is just a problem on the internet (note the lower case "i" cause I don't give a shit), you will have a rude awakening when you start getting on your squadron's email list.

College degree does not mean using proper versions of words or using a spell checker. But if you want to be the grammer police for your OpsO, by all means....

 

[nittany03]

College degree does not mean using proper versions of words or using a spell checker. But if you want to be the grammer police for your OpsO, by all means....

 

[Mumbles]

"Internet" is considered a proper noun, these days.

In all seriousness - I fully agree! Nothing pisses me off more than reading "your stupid" on the Internet.

what about, "the internets"?

 

[phrogdriver]

A "hanger" is what you put your clothes on.

A "hangar" is where you park aircraft.

 

[Schnugg]

Here let me try....

It will only get worst in the fleet.


:crazy_125

 

[gotta_fly]

Can we add capitalization to the list?

 

[MIDNJAC]

While I would say that this site is better in terms of grammatical correct-ness than many other forums, the military has not been immune to this in my short experience. I can probably count the number of .ppt presentations on one hand that I watched when I was in NROTC which had 100% correct spelling and punctuation. Same thing goes for the majority of command emails that I have received.