How Much Are You Bothered by Spelling, Grammar, Capitalization, and Punctuation Errors

[MineralMan]

on the Internet?

This seems like a reasonable question, and may give us some idea of how much of a problem such errors are or are believed to be by people.

53 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Extremely Bothered - They make me discount the content completely.
	4 (8%)
	Very Bothered - They make me seriously question the validity of the content.
	18 (34%)
	Moderately Bothered - Such errors are very annoying, and indicate poor thinking.
	12 (23%)
	Somewhat Bothered - I get annoyed at this, but try to look past them and at the content.
	10 (19%)
	Not Very Bothered - It's the Internet. People aren't as careful with their writing.
	5 (9%)
	Hardly Bothered at All - I not really concerned about people making such errors.
	1 (2%)
	Knot Botheered at Awl - Whut errurs?
	2 (4%)
	I'm Repulsed by This Poll.
	1 (2%)
	I Always Vote in Polls.
	0 (0%)
	Dingbats Rule!
	0 (0%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
Show usernames Disclaimer: This is an Internet poll

[jberryhill]

1. Less bothered since smartphones came out

You can't tell if someone is typing with their thumbs on a tiny screen, so I'm not as bothered as I used to be.

[arely staircase]

11. this^^ nt

[msanthrope]

46. I have to 'speak' some of my posts with my smartphone, since sometimes I cannot write.

Those are always fun.

[jberryhill]

146. Posting to DU while driving is tough!

[msanthrope]

147. I've found myself pulling over to the side of the road more than once to answer a DU post. nt

[jberryhill]

148. I just drive with my knees....

...because one of these days I might know an answer to the Friday Art Quiz, and I can't let that moment pass me by.

Although when I'm abroad, I sometimes have a rental with a manual transmission.

[msanthrope]

149. Ah--but I have the 10 year old in the car! And I drive a boat--a big Dodge.

Used to drive a stick. I miss it.

[jberryhill]

155. I used to drive a stick

Now I drive a twig to save on gas.

[msanthrope]

157. Leaf off the puns, will ya? nt

[kelliekat44]

61. I guess texting doesn't bother anyone? nt

[MineralMan]

75. Texting doesn't bother me.

I don't text, and I never open texts for reading on my primitive flip phone, either.

[NoPasaran]

81. Texting makes Jesus cry.

[MineralMan]

90. dere jesis,

cn u pls hlp me?

A Texted Prayer

[hobbit709]

2. The one that bugs me the most is "lightening" instead of "lightning"

[MineralMan]

3. I'm always entranced by the lightening sky at dawn.

Less so by lightning strikes near my home.

[randome]

12. For me it's 'seperate' instead of 'separate'.

It's a simple rule! E's on the outside, A's on the inside!

But, on the whole, the English language is fucked up anyways and I can easily see societal evolution transforming 'through' into 'thru', which it already has in a lot of cases, such as on street signs.

[hr]
[font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font]
[hr]

[MineralMan]

16. My fifth grade English teacher, among other things,

said, "There is a rat in separate."

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

150. I'll admit that for many years, I spelt it "seperate"

Because that's the way I pronounce it.

My twin brother, who is a terrible speller, has said that it is his life's ambition to desecrate the grave of Samuel Johnson.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

105. Reminds me of something Mark Twain said:

The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug.

[treestar]

115. Mine is "loosing" for "losing"

And try and rather than try to.

[FarCenter]

4. BUT I CAN'T STAND ALL CAPS!!!!!!

[MineralMan]

5. i dON'T bLAME yOU!

[narnian60]

6. Lose vs. loose

Aaaaargh!

[MineralMan]

8. You can't lose if you maintain a loose interpretation

of English usage, I guess.

[Scurrilous]

17. And its variant..

Loser vs. Looser.

[msanthrope]

47. A 'looser' is someone I don't want to stand behind. nt

[Scurrilous]

62. Especially 'hugh looser.'

[louis-t]

97. My biggest pet peeve!

It only bothers me because it is so common. Ridiculously common. One other one is 'leagal' for 'legal'.

[Xyzse]

7. I went for a pass because

Very Bothered - They make me seriously question the validity of the content, but I try to look past them and figure out the content.

[kiva]

13. This, exactly.

[Control-Z]

31. Yes. This. (nt)

[thelordofhell]

9. It only bothers me if I spot them in regular articles..........

Shows that there is no editorial control..............

[Freddie]

127. ^^^this^^^

Who cares if it's regular people like here or in a comments section. But when it's from
someone who is being paid to write (a publication or advertising)--arrghh!
Front page article of an award winning newspaper--"he was in the throws of a dilemma." No.

[Wait Wut]

10. I've become more tolerant.

I no longer correct the husband's FB posts.

[MineralMan]

14. Then he will be "hoist by his own petard,"

I guess.

[Wait Wut]

19. Of course.

I still correct the shopping lists. One is never too old to learn how to spell mayonnaise correctly.

Honestly, I do it more to see his facial expression. Confusion is attractive in some men.

[oldhippie]

15. It bothers me especially when ........

..... the person making the error just finished a rant about how much smarter and more educated we are compared to those stupid, ignorant, knuckle-dragging Neanderthal Republicans. I cringe every time.

[MineralMan]

18. It is always wise to proofread any rant you write about

such errors very carefully, and more than once.

[TheCowsCameHome]

24. Double points awarded for this post. ^

[TDale313]

43. Yeah, I agree with that.

If you're gonna call someone else stupid, it's good if you don't mix up "there", "they're" and "their" or "its" and "it's" in the same post, for example.,

[On the Road]

153. I Collect Examples of Errors

and it's rare to see a post pointing out spelling or grammatical errors which does not contain some kind of error itself.

[oldhippie]

154. That is so true .....

... and I cringe even worse when I do it myself.

[TheCowsCameHome]

20. Thanks for posting this pole

It's long overdo, in my opinion.

[MineralMan]

22. Ewe our wright.

Speling maters.

[pinboy3niner]

41. "To err is human; to forgive, ovine"

[TDale313]

21. It doesn't bother me too much.

I do tend to get pretty embarrassed when I catch one of my own mistakes or typos.

[randome]

27. Nearly all my posts will show a 'Last Edited' time on them.

But not this one.

[hr]
[font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font]
[hr]

[csziggy]

23. What bothers me more is that after decades of reading on the internet

I am doing more and more of the errors in my own typing! My most common typo used to be "teh" as my fingers flew over the keyboard. But recently I have noticed I am inadvertently using more of the common internet errors. At least I have not started to use inappropriate apostrophes - one of my pet peeves.

[MineralMan]

25. I believe that should be "apostrophe's."

[csziggy]

42. !'!'!''''''

[Link Speed]

93. Yeah, that drive's me crazy. nt

[RebelOne]

106. It drives me up a tree when posters use apostrophes with plural nouns. n/t

[patrice]

26. I'm worried that the logic of our language is dis-integrating. It troubles me that it seems

people are unaware of how deeply they can be mis-understood and people can make mistakes about what is being communicated. Grammar and mechanics of language are essentially about logic and rationality, even in its more non-rational form, like poetry.

Even if mis-understanding and error don't happen to happen, I wonder about how much humanity is lost to the fact that fewer and fewer people are wondering, asking questions, and thinking about how OTHERS perceive and understand the content of what we are saying to one another.

If none of that matters, why bother? What ARE we doing? Is all of this really only for self-gratification and power acquisition however fleeting?

[customerserviceguy]

28. It's a sign of a poor education

And that causes me to question what else the person knows.

[MineralMan]

34. Even well educated people make typing

errors. When that happens, I take it more as a sign of over-eagerness to post quickly. Only errors that are caused by a poor understanding of language are bothersome to me.

[customerserviceguy]

45. Well, there's education

and there's education. What I mean is that I've met folks who went to grad school that you could describe as "educated", yet really didn't pick up or retain much from that. I recall an incident in 2004 when my ex-girlfriend and I were in Utah, and she was preparing to go to Iraq for her company, to set up training and employment centers there. She had no idea exactly where Iraq even was, and when I whipped out a pen, and started drawing a map of the Middle East on a napkin, she was blown away. My associates degree (from tech school, no less) beat her master's from Oregon State University.

I don't always blame the education industry for poorly educating students, I also fault them for not picking up everything they could have access to. When my son complained about a couple of his high school teachers, I told him to never let a bad teacher stand in the way of him getting an education in the particular subject, he could always do additional reading or study.

[LanternWaste]

91. It is however, rather easy in most cases to see the difference between a typo and a poor spelling...

It is however, rather easy in most cases to see the difference between a typo and a poor spelling.

We can't often use typo as an excuse when we use 'there' rather than 'they're'. And, as over 3/4 of typos are due to the adjacency or close proximity of keys (e.g., 'poinr' rather than 'point'), that too allows us an additional tool to distinguish the too from each other. (intentional joke for make the point).

Working in an industry where everything on my co-workers' desks gets a first round proof, a second round proof, and a final proof has led me to believe that the typo is less common than imagined, and poor spelling skills much more common than imagined.

I would think the more well educated a person, the more pride they would take in their ability to communicate effectively and efficiently, regardless of the medium.

[MineralMan]

95. I don't disagree with you on those points.

As someone who makes a living by banging on a keyboard, I literally eat my words. Even so, I sometimes make errors when writing. Not too many, since I type with my head up, looking at the monitor, and catch most errors when they happen. But, I still proofread everything twice before turning it in to a client. Even then, an occasional error will creep in.

Frustrating.

[Scuba]

29. In resumes, very much bothered. Elsewhere, not so much.

[MineralMan]

39. I once did not hire a programmer, because

code he wrote failed to run because of multiple misspellings. Even though the logic in the code was OK, the hassles of dealing with stupid misspellings would have destroyed efficiency.

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

107. As long as he was consistent, the compiler doesn't care

All the interviews I've done, they focus on logic not spelling... never held me back :p

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

109. Misspellings can be significant in computer code

Circa 1990, I had to program in DEC's BASIC+2. I misspelt a variable name, and the compiler said, "Oh, here is a new variable, I will accept it, give it a value of null if it is a string or zero if it is a number, and continue on my merry way without telling anyone". This might be acceptable in an interactive, interpreted language, but not in a compiled language. It should at least have given me a warning about an undeclared variable.

[MineralMan]

113. Ah, BASIC and its undeclared variables.

What fun.

[aquart]

30. Extremely bothered. Distracts from content I may not wish to discount.

[tridim]

32. I don't care that much, but...

I do make assumptions about a person's education based on the proper or improper use of there, they're and their.

[RedCappedBandit]

33. Depends where on 'the internet'...

but I voted moderately.

[surrealAmerican]

122. This is my stance too.

If it is a supposedly "professional" site, it just looks unprofessional. If it's just some unpaid people expressing opinions, it's pretty much to be expected.

[RevStPatrick]

35. I come from a family of editors.

It's a curse, I tell ya!

[MrSlayer]

36. Poor grammar is the sign of a lazy mind.

I am a grammar nazi, I can't help myself.

http://m.

[Tikki]

37. Hardly bothered...what they SAY is WAY MORE IMPORTANT than some writing errors...

Tikki

[Bluenorthwest]

38. Content is what counts.

I expect professionalism in professional settings, here I expect humanity and honesty which is far too much to ask of some folks anyway.

[MineralMan]

64. Indeed it is.

I'm not going anywhere, by the way. Sorry.

[Bluenorthwest]

116. Were you asked to go somewhere? No, you were not.

I don't give a shit about that which a proof reader can correct for a fee, I care about thought, content, honesty and human decency, which is all to often lacking in many posters here.

The only thing worse than a person who falsely claims a post was satire that failed is a poster who posts failed satire. I have for more respect for satire than I do for anti gay propagandists, for example. How about you?
The other thing that annoys me on DU is 'self deletion' addicts. Those who can not stand by that which they hurl. Annoying.

[MineralMan]

118. None of that has anything whatsoever to do with this thread.

So, I will simply ignore it.

See you in my next thread.

[Bluenorthwest]

123. It has everything to do with this thread. Does X annoy you? No, Y annoys me.

Sorry if my focus is not on the comma, which you overuse as badly as I do, but on content.
And 'to ignore' is a verb with an actual meaning. Responding to what I said is the opposite of ignoring what I said. The opposite.

[MineralMan]

125. Ignore is also a function on DU.

I believe I will take advantage of it, making a special exception to my normal practice.

[Bluenorthwest]

152. So what? Why announce it? Why not just do so? Does the fanfare stoke your jets?

Do as you please. We both know what it is. Many on DU know what it is as well. The chatter around DU is that every time one of your anti gay posts gets found out and you 'self delete' them, you follow with OPs about grammar. It is a cycle you carry out. Next will be posts about your neighborhood, the house next door usually sells for the first time in years each time this year, for example. Transparent is as transparent does.

[MotherPetrie]

40. I LOL at "Knot Botheered at Awl - Whut errurs?"

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

44. It depends on the context

On resumes or cover letters, in formal correspondence, in public presentation materials, etc.: it bothers me a lot.

Text messages, informal e-mails, informal communication, etc.: not so much.

It also depends on whether the errors are made by native English speakers or not. I'm not a native English speaker and, for some reason, it bothers me more when people who use English as their first and native tongue make very careless mistakes that can easily be avoided: they're, their, there, its, it's, and so on.

I guess if I learned how to avoid these mistakes and English is not even my native tongue, it is not unreasonable to expect those who have English as their native tongue to do likewise.

[planetc]

48. If there's one or more errors in the subject line, I usually skip the post entirely. nt

[kentauros]

49. I only hold journalists to that high standard.

They're reporting important news after all. They should know better, or at least first send it to an editor that does, for, you know, editing!

[MineralMan]

52. The state of editing these days is very poor.

Where all publications used to pass content through a chain of editors, many have no editorial oversight at all any longer. Instead, they appear to rely on spelling and grammar checkers in software. And since computers cannot understand English, some of the errors are comical.

Not all "journalists" are good journalists, in any case.

[kentauros]

70. That's true.

Twitter may be making things even worse. I don't know how it is on all phones, but some of the 'dumber' ones, like mine, don't have spellcheck in the message field for texts.

I get the feeling that immediacy has trumped accuracy, and I don't think it'll get any better unless the software does.

[MineralMan]

73. I had to turn off the automatic substitution feature

on my tablet. The vocabulary of its spelling checker is much smaller than my vocabulary and it kept swapping in incorrect words for words I had properly spelled, but that weren't in its dictionary.

Microsoft Word has a larger dictionary, but I still have to add words to it frequently to keep it from annoying me. I do, however, use its autocorrect feature to type many phrases I often use when I enter a shortcut. In some cases it's a big time-saver, especially when I'm writing website content that contains trademark symbols. I keep adding brand names into the autocorrect dictionary to save time.

Company names, too, are frequently used, and sometimes are made up of multiple works, like Johnny Reb's Heating and Air Conditioning Service. I'm not typing that more than once, so I use JRH, and let Word do the typing.

[kentauros]

86. I'm the same way with Word and autocorrect.

What perplexes me is reading something like damnyouautocorrect.com and wonder why people continue to use that feature. The other thing about it that doesn't make sense is why the default dictionaries would have "nonsense words" included. I can understand that people likely add all the vulgar words to their dictionaries, but the inclusion of nonsensical words into the default dictionaries makes even less sense.

It's almost as if the dictionary-creators have an agenda to mess up people's relationships

[RebelOne]

108. You are so correct.

I was a copy editor for 13 years and worked with 7 editors and none of them used correct punctuation or grammar. I used to have a field day correcting their stories.

[madinmaryland]

50. Their, there, they're, Mineral Man. Everything will be just fine!!

[MineralMan]

53. I won't count on that, as is my wont.

I'm nothing if not skeptical.

[RC]

51. I am bothered by the miss use of

There - Their - They're
To - too
lose - loose
affect - effect
site - sight
your - you're
its - it's
weather - whether

There are a lot more, but these are the common words most abused.

[MineralMan]

54. I must not comment. I must not comment.

I must not comment.

There....all better now...

[moondust]

57. miss use - misuse

[RC]

60. I do know that - Honest!

Really. Ya gotta believe me.

[RC]

59. Ok, I screwed up

I need to proof read more better. That is the major problem with posts such as these. All but guaranteed...

[MineralMan]

63. I think the word you want is "betterer."

Aye cud bee rong, tho.

[narnian60]

130. More betterer.

If you are going to make it wrong, take it all the way!

[Nay]

139. Let me add a few:

reign -- rein
loose -- lose
it's -- its
cite -- site -- sight
incite -- insight
ordinance -- ordnance

[dipsydoodle]

55. Using completely the wrong word stands out more.

Then instead of than for example.

[MineralMan]

58. That's an excellent example.

It's one that always puzzles me, too. It's not a typo, clearly. Then and than are too different on the keyboard.

[dipsydoodle]

68. Also seems to be unique to US posters.

[MineralMan]

69. Well, I'm smarter then they are, I guess.

I think it may be a regional pronunciation thing, actually. I hear some people pronouncing "then" and "than" the same, sometimes. Lazy speech leads to lazy spelling, it seems.

[tridim]

71. That's a mute point.

That one makes me LOL every time.

I learned it from Jesse Jackson on SNL in the 80's, "The Question Is Moot!"

http://www.maniacworld.com/question-is-moot.html

[TheCowsCameHome]

82. Good point. It's just not exceptable. n/t

[dipsydoodle]

100. lol

[MelungeonWoman]

56. Not really.

I am much more concerned with my own errors than those of others. Wall of texts, otoh, make me eager to scroll.

[House of Roberts]

65. My biggest concern is lack of commas and periods in posts.

Sometimes it's hard to understand what a person really means when there's no way to know where one sentence ends and the next begins.

[MineralMan]

66. Yes. That's a real issue, too.

On the other hand, my wife often finds too many commas in my writing, which is somewhat embarrassing. I am, apparently, a master splicer and a captain of comma misuse.

[LWolf]

67. Other:

I'm extremely bothered. I'm a Language Arts teacher. I spend my professional life trying to eradicate those errors and teach those standard conventions.

I don't dismiss the content, though. I find it sloppy, lazy, and embarrassing, but I understand that people don't always read what they've typed before they post. I understand that not everyone was raised on standardized language conventions, that slang is legitimate expression, and that language is constantly evolving along with the means of communication.

It's interesting to note that, on DU, those kinds of errors made by Republicans are fodder for ridicule. It's okay to use language conventions to put down the "enemy," but not your own.

[Bigmack]

72. 30 years a high school teacher...

Spelling and grammar and syntax are important.

With all the sloppy English I see written today...

... I fear the next step down is flinging our shit at each other.

[MineralMan]

74. Well, since we are just primates with thinner hair,

we'll probably end up doing what primates do, in the end.

[Coyotl]

76. It says a lot about IQ and attitude

[MineralMan]

77. Attitude more than IQ, I think.

[Coyotl]

126. Moran guy is a good example

Maybe more about education and, of course, English as a first language or not, than about IQ.

But, I'll have to except Homo moranis

[JackN415]

78. I put on my ignore list anyone ridiculing another just because of spelling. It shows their ...

shallowness of thoughts and ideas.

[MineralMan]

80. OK.

[Logical]

141. I 100% agree. Assholes mostly. n-t

[Gravitycollapse]

79. Who gives a fuck about an Oxford comma?

[MineralMan]

85. Now, that's funny, hilarious and amusing,

to be trebly redundant.

[wickerwoman]

83. Significantly less bothered than I am by people who focus on or correct those errors

instead of addressing the actual argument.

People make errors when they are in a hurry or are less educated or because they don't place that much value on perfect English.

People only correct errors to be smug or as a lame excuse to discount the opinions of others.

[MicaelS]

84. Extremely bothered.

I don't care how many degrees, or how much education a person claims they have, if they cannot spell, or use proper punctuation, especially the proper use of capital letters, that demeans their message, and I am going to give it less credence.

[xxqqqzme]

87. I have noticed of late the alarming

frequency of person unable to correctly use 'then' and 'than'. It seems persons are using the words as if they interchangeable.

[Gravitycollapse]

88. Some people have a truly difficult time discerning between the two.

And it has nothing to do with laziness or even intelligence. Some people, especially those who had literacy issues as a child, have mental blocks when it comes to common spelling errors.

For instance, I had an extremely tough time figuring out how to use commas, semi-colons and apostrophes in 6th grade even though I read at a college level. I've never fully recovered.

[MineralMan]

89. There was a brief discussion of that earlier in the thread.

It occurs to me that some people pronounce the two words the same in some usages. That might explain the interchangeability of the spellings in some people's writing. I'm not sure, though.

[kentauros]

144. I sometimes have to individually damn my fingers

for dyslexically interchanging the two words. I usually catch it, after my fingers spend a little time in Hell first

[Yo_Mama]

92. In newspapers, they bother me a lot

I don't know why. But it doesn't change my views of the content.

[geckosfeet]

94. My therapist says I am obsessed about it....

She's right.

[ileus]

96. I could care less...

[MineralMan]

99. We all could, I'm sure.

[In_The_Wind]

102. rut roh

[kentauros]

143. You COULD care less,

however, it is obvious that you, indeed, do not care less. Do you care more, instead?

[WinkyDink]

98. Welllllll....I used to teach the stuff, so I get moderately annoyed. But I HATE "LEAD" for "LED"!

[gvstn]

101. I can't help but be somewhat bothered once I see an error

But to be honest, I rarely go back after submitting a post to fix a simple typo. I've even let a "there"/"their error slide by without correction.

[azurnoir]

103. There's at least 40 folks here

that Don West would love as jurors

[WinkyDink]

114. What a completely asinine remark. I hate the condescending "folks," too, so thanks for playing.

[azurnoir]

117. asinine? it was hardly condescending but a point in fact

if a spelling or punctuation mistake makes you disregard content then that's condescending and rather pointless too

also reading about the Zimmerman trial that's approximately what West is attempting with at least one witness IMO

sorry you're offended
ETA went back and looked seems you're one who disregards because of spelling or punctuation errors personally I take content or thought first, then spelling and punctuation

[RebelOne]

104. I am extremely bothered because I worked as a copy editor 16 years

for 30 outdoors magazines, and my job was to correct spelling, grammatical, capitalization and punctuation errors. Many of these errors that I see all over the Internet make me want to pull my hair out. I restrain myself when I see those types of errors here at DU. But there are a few times when I have lost control and pointed out the mistakes.

[MineralMan]

111. I have had dealings with copy editors.

I've always enjoyed my conversations with them, and sometimes even won. My favorite copy editor was the copy chief for one of the magazines for which I was a contributing editor. She and I often had knock-down drag-out battles over usage. She was something of a strict constructionist when it came to the AP style book. I was, and am, a descriptive grammarian, rather than a prescriptive one.

That led to many amusing conversations. Occasionally, I was able to prevail, but the AP style book generally won the day.

On the other hand, I once got a copy editor fired at a major book publisher. She, a recent college graduate, did not understand the content she was editing. The book in question was an instructional book about WordPerfect 6.0 for MSDOS. A good portion of the book contained snippets written in WordPerfect's macro language.

This copy editor had read in her style guide that it was better to use "When" instead of "If" at the beginning of most sentences. So, if I wrote, "If WordPerfect crashes, you can recover part of what you had written by..." It was only humorous when she changed that "If" to "When." Of course, that version of WordPerfect often crashed, so that was appropriate, perhaps.

However, when her global search and replace change programming code statments from If statements to meaningless When statements, that code would not run.

I called the copy editor and explained that she had made a grievous error and that she needed to revert to my original writing. She got angry and told me that I would have to go through the manuscript and manually change her erroneous search and replace changes.

My next call was to the publisher's office, where I made it clear that I was not about to make hundreds of changes, manually, to correct the copy editor's incompetence. He agreed, and dismissed the editor forthwith. Someone else fixed the errors, by reversing the process and selectively making appropriate changes. As it turned out, WordPerfect 6.0 for MSDOS was a major turkey on the market, and my book never earned its advance on royalties. But, never mind.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

121. I have a book which infuriates me because of sloppy copyediting

It's John Julius Norwich's A Short History of Byzantium. Apparently, the copy editor used a computerized spell checker, and picked the first suggestion whenever it came across a misspelt word. All the words are spelt correctly, but sometimes it's the wrong word. For example, in a discussion of a sixth-century heresy called "monothelitism," the word "monotheism" is used once. If I were Lord Norwich, I would be extremely annoyed.

I also remember an historical novel I once read, in which the word "parameter" is used instead of "perimeter."

The worst misspelling I know of is a woman who has a tattoo on her arm of 1 Corinthians 13:13 -- "Faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love" -- with "Corinthians" misspelt.

[RebelOne]

136. The AP style book was our bible for the copy editors at the publishing company where I worked. n/t

[SheilaT]

110. Makes me crazy, but I don't correct

publicly. I do, on occasion, send a PM to someone to let them know they might want to change something.

I'm most crazed by incorrectly using lie and lay. It's obvious that for thirty years or more school in this country have not bothered to teach the difference between those two.

Also, the auto-correct features are sometimes wrong. My version of Word invariably gets it's and its wrong. In the past I've noticed some other grammar features they are (or were) incorrect on. I recall being in a class where a non-native speaker of English said he relied on the grammar check function of Word, which of course made sense, but it also made him preserve certain errors. Sigh.

[siligut]

112. The kindest, wisest and most talented man I have ever known was practically illiterate

I look for the message in any post, but if it is poorly written and I also disagree with the message, in my mind, I will use the poor presentation to self-bolster my position.

[npk]

119. This country needs a bag grammar lobby in Washington

It's the only way I see this problem truly being addressed.

[MineralMan]

120. What you said...

I think.

[npk]

124. LOL. I am the worse offender.

Lock me up.

[bigwillq]

128. Little or no concern

Not bothered very much by it. I try to spell things correctly and use spell check, but if I misspell a word on the internet, my life will go on.

[Johonny]

129. the purpose of communication is to be understood

if you understood what the person was saying the rest is just fluff.

If your only response is to correct grammar than you really had nothing to say.

[BlueCaliDem]

131. Not very bothered unless a poster is criticizing my errors with a post full of errors.

Then it becomes personal and I go after them like a buzzard on a gut-wagon.

[cherokeeprogressive]

132. I had to pass. While the mistakes others make hardly bother me at all, MY mistakes stand out

like sore thumbs to me.

[savalez]

133. I am more bothered by those who think

they have won the debate simply because their opponent misspelled a word.

[Logical]

142. +1000 n-t

[sibelian]

134. It drives me demented. nt

[loyalsister]

135. Mine- A LOT!

Other people's, not so much. Most of us make at least a few errors now and again.

[hunter]

137. Never.

English is such a mess it hardly matters.

The power of English is that it spontaneously breeds new words and usages, and it easily adopts words, spelling, and grammar from other languages.

It'd be an awful thing to freeze this wretched language as it is.

Evolution is good.

Write first, edit later.

I only edit posts here if I've screwed up a link or my meaning is catastrophically unclear. Any other times my edits can only mean my OCD is drifting out of control again. In my most wretched states I'll spend hours writing computer code that's perfect but of no consequence. Perfection is the enemy of the good.

I have a vision of "perfect," I'm very well educated by most standards, but I try not to let the perfect get in the way of what I want, and especially not get in the way of what is good.

Feel free to criticize my opinions; but anyone criticize my spelling or grammar, I ain't gonna pay attention.

[mythology]

138. I can forgive one or two errors as everybody makes mistakes.

But if those mistakes turn into patterns, or the person doesn't even try, I'm more than willing to put them on ignore. My theory is, if they can't be bothered to try to write correctly, they probably don't have anything especially vital or interesting to say.

There's also an exception for people who clearly aren't native speakers.

I'm so anal retentive that I use capitalization and punctuation as well as spelling out words in text messages. I am proud to say that I've never used the letter U as a stand in for the word you or the letter R as a stand in for the word are.

[Logical]

140. I think anyone who is very bothered is someone I would not enjoy spending time with. n-t

[kentauros]

145. I can forgive people online for the most part,

as I sometimes deal with clumsy fingers/dyslexic control (Fingers. Why do you keep typing out "wiht"?)

Thankfully, the human mind can rearrange the letters and we understand what was meant, even as our egos balk at the outrageous errors

[Democracyinkind]

151. Ever since the advent of smart phones, I gave up caring...

As I noticed that I'm prone to make mistakes when writing from my smart phone that are absolutely inexplicable to me. Even that damn than/then thing, which, by itself, has nothing to do with posting from the smart phone. It's as if my brain has two separate compartments for both.

Also, using spell check from my Iphone is a real hassle, at least on DU.

[hopemountain]

156. may i share why i type in all lower case?

an elder taught me that with all things, no one thing is above another. writing in lower case helps me to keep this perspective. although, no doubt, some have put me on ignore for this very reason.