Microsoft Edits English

jbarr writes "An article in the 23-Oct-2000 issue of the New York Times (free reg blah blah blah) talks about how Microsoft has eliminated words from its thesaurus so as to "not suggest words that may have offensive uses or provide offensive definitions for any words". Entering a word like "idiot" yields no hits in Word 2000 unlike the numerous hits in Word 97." I don't think there's anything evil here, but it sure is funny.

Comments

1984 Anyone?

[Pilchie]

Nothing evil here. Have you ever read 1984?

Restricting language is _very_ evil.

Re:1984 Anyone?

[BlackHawk]

Your position is naive in the extreme, and you are missing the danger. Look more closely at the situation, please.

MS Windows controls the desktop market with over 90% marketshare. This is a fact.

The word processor package most Windows workstations (home or office) use is Word. This is also a fact. Even systems built for the home market are being shipped with the Small Business edition of Office. University students here at UW-Madison (WI) have the opportunity (through a deal between the UW and MS) to purchase full-blown version of Office 2000 Professional for $26, which of course encourages students to use that package.

Now, an observation I've recently made is that people are much, much more reliant on the MS tools for grammar, spelling and word selection that I would have believed. We recently rolled out MS Exchange with Outlook, and I was planning on allowing my remote users to avoid the pain of setting up a VPN client and running the Outlook fat client by simply using the Outlook Web Agent. The plan was nixed shortly after roll-out. The primary reasons? No spellchecker, no access to the grammar and thesaurus tools. I was stunned to find that of the 30 people in the HQ, only I and one other person did not have to resort to those tools to craft a business-grade letter or email.

In short, more people than you would believe need those tools to express themselves. And thanks to Orwell's 1984, we do know what happens when you start removing definitions and /or associations from words: people lose the ability to communicate certain ideas. And after a time, people will lose the ability to formulate those ideas.

Microsoft's actions in this case are reprehensible, and they are rightly being taken to task for it.

Re:1984 Anyone?

[MadAhab]

Right on. Naive, gullible, simple, credulous, green, unsophisticated, and an easy mark. I'm constantly amazed at how many people can't craft a basic business letter. Once upon a time, people prided themselves on being educated, and even though most of them were self-educated, they were more literate than their counterparts today.

Re:1984 Anyone?

[ichimunki]

Well, considering that 1984 is a work of fiction, as a result of it being written "we do know" nothing. What the book does, in a way, is extend the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis stating that grammar and vocabulary influence thought-- which seems obvious enough. Except that it is ludicrous. At some point all thoughts were original and at some point there were no words (unless you believe in some creation myth and the attendant notion that language is a natural gift of humankind). It naturally follows that words, over time, gained an association with hard objects and then actions. Then with ephemeral matters such as ideas and feelings.

But at some point, some words had to be invented specifically to describe things that had never been described before. And the resulting word also needed a definition, probably mostly consisting of other, previously existing words-- an exception would be inventions, where the truest definition for the new word would be the invention itself, barring that a description of the invention.

While the lack of certain grammatical forms or vocabulary items may discourage their use, since they will be tagged as incorrect regardless of their actual correctness, there is no empirical evidence to support the idea that this will limit thought and the creation of ways to express this thought. More likely, as with politically-correct-speak, the result may only be slight discoloration of the thoughts.

Your associates who are too stupid to form grammatically correct sentences and spell words from memory do not use the spelling and grammar tools to formulate their ideas. They merely use them to alter their hasty or incompetent presentation of them so that they don't look like morons. The thesaurus is almost never a good tool to do anything but replace repeat occurrences of the same word with a couple of different words to liven up the text-- standard "Elements of Style" approach.

None of this should be construed as a defense of Microsoft. I find that their behavior in this regard and in many others to be highly objectionable-- and their products to be avoided if at all possible. If I'm paying for the tool to check my grammar and spelling, it should do it accurately and to accepted standards. Removing words is simply making your tool less apt for the job I have at hand... and it is for this reason that I would avoid this tool. It's expensive and it doesn't work? Forget them.

Re:1984 Anyone?

[bungalow]

No big brother here. Move along...

Thanks for your comforting words. However, you're an idiot.

What's an idiot?

Re:1984 Anyone?

[Cylix]

Your references have no bearing on the discussion of relevancy. Racial and ethnic slurs go a little further past the line (similar to a tomahawk missile crossing the baltic ocean).

Idiot and moron are two very commonly accepted forms of speaking disproval. The context which they are used in denotes the strength of the allegation.

What is deemed offensive is what society deems it as. Those same peers who determine our laws and our values. This is why public nudity is illegal in most places I know, but yet other countries allow public nude beaches (at least topless I've seen). This is because their society deems that not to be offensive.

In our society few would argue that idiot and moron carry the same strength as saying "Nigger."

Thus when I say you are an idiot for using such drstic comparisonss, I have not stepped over the line in my use of language.

If I had said you were a fucking moron for using such drastic comparisons, then I would have stepped over the line.

I'm not sure of the impact that will occurr because microsoft chooses to drop a few words from its thesauras. Perhaps the wrong is where a corporation or smaller entity is choosing the path society should take. I'll remind you, MS has been found to be a monopoly. As such they are treated differently then other entities. They have more resources, leverage, and ability to cause great harm then other organizations. This really means they should be watched a great deal more carefully then the rest.

Re:1984 Anyone?

[foobar104]

We should just give all cases of all words no matter what?

I think the point is that it's Microsoft doing the choosing. We have established, respected organizations that make dictionaries and thesaur... thes... uh, dictionaries, just dictionaries.

Anyway, my point is that Microsoft really should just license Webster's or the OED or something and stop making these kinds of decisions.

Re:1984 Anyone?

[susano_otter]

But at some point, some words had to be invented specifically to describe things that had never been described before.

Whithout debating your entire post, I wanted to point out, in relation to the excerpt above, that my experience with foreign languages indicates something very interesting: cultures don't always develop words for previously unspecified concepts.

For example, the Portuguese word "saudade" can be roughly translated into English as "homesickness" - but this is a rough translation indeed. The actual concept, the complex feelings evoked by the word do not have an equivalent verbal descriptor in English. As a result - there are feelings and ideas that Brazilians are capable of thinking and talking about, that Americans aren't. Unless maybe the American in question is a gifted poet, but even then she would require many more English words to evoke the feelings associated with the simple Portuguese "saudade".

Without claiming to be an expert, I'm sure that most Chinese ideograms present the same difficulties to a translator.

What all this suggests to me is that a culture's vocabulary is both (1) an manifestation of the issues that are important to that culture and (2) possibly the only rational tool for discussing those issues. I suspect that without a particular word, it would be almost impossible to have any discourse on the thing that word describes, and, over time, we as a culture would simply stop thinking about that thing (whatever it was).

After all, how often do we Americans discuss the pros and cons of schadenfreude, or bishonen?

Re:1984 Anyone?

[lhand]

Man, I haven't gotten any nugatory in so long...wait, let me look that up.......

Never mind.

New Synonym Algorithm

[ekrout]

I believe that they have simply seeded the synonym algorithm for every "curse word" with a random value for the subscript of an array of every M$FT employee since the company's inception. Therefore, if you type in "f*ckhead", Steve Ballmer might be a suggested replacement. Similarly, "assh*le" is often times replaced by "William H. Gates" in the new Office XP. Just don't ask for a replacement for "naked clippy". ;-)

Paranioa?

[Malorian]

Greetings friend citizen, the computer is your friend. Why do you want to use such words? Are you unhappy? **BzzRRRRtttt**

We're idiots

[OblongPlatypus]

From an unedited thesaurus:

Idiot [noun]: ass, fool, imbecile, jackass, mooncalf, moron, nincompoop, ninny, nitwit, simple, simpleton, softhead, tomfool. Informal: dope, gander, goose. Slang: cretin, ding-dong, dip, goof, jerk, nerd, schmo, schmuck, turkey

Slashdot: News for Idiots. Stuff that matters.

It's because of the licence agreement...

[chris.bitmead]

You're not allowed to use MS products to criticise Microsoft, and extensive market research determined that the most common use of these terms was in relation to Microsoft and Bill Gates.

Great!

[garoush]

All those book authors who write books using MS Word 2000 are no longer able to write books titled: "XYZ for Dummies/idiots".

For once, MS has done the right thing.

That's double plus ludicrous!

[los furtive]

Is this their solution to bloatware? They sole purpose of a thesaurus is to enhance one's vocabulary not limit it. What's next on their agenda, making it impossible to change the desktop colours unless they are coordinated? Is something in the works with Martha Stewart?

Not a good move

[Clovert Agent]

This is not a good idea, for at least two reasons that strike me as being so obvious I can't believe the marketing idio..er..moro..um..people at Microsoft didn't consider it.
Firstly, where's the accountability? Who's making the decision about which words to omit, and which to include? Do we really want to trust Microsoft to make decisions on our behalf regarding our use of language? Not really. This is not going to do much to raise trust in MS, although it probably won't do much to lower it either. It's a small enough fringe issue that most people will never know, which is part of why it's dangerous.
Second, there's the issue of market appeal. Office is supposed to be a writing (etc) tool for professionals. But writing professionals _need_ tools such as thesauri, dictionaries and the like, and we rely on them to be comprehensive. A thesaurus that gives me only a limited number of options is of very limited worth. Sometimes I need to use words that some people might find offensive.
This strikes me as an absurd move on the part of Microsoft; they're dabbling in an area where they have no expertise, making decisions for which they are unqualified. It's not like they would have got any criticism for leaving un-PC terms in the damn thesaurus. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

and ...?

[Mr_Silver]

So what? Americans have been editing the English language for centuries now! :)

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Editing English

[bgarcia]

Microsoft Edits English

Just be glad that CmdrTaco doesn't have that sort of power.