The Great Typo Hunt

jamie writes "Incensed by a 'no tresspassing' sign, Jeff Deck launched a cross-country trip to right grammatical wrongs. He enlisted a friend, Benjamin D. Herson, and together they erased errant quotation marks, rectified misspellings and cut unnecessary possessive apostrophes. The Great Typo Hunt is the story of their crusade." We have already covered the duo's fight with The National Park Service.

Comments

He would be right at home on slashdot

[pgmrdlm]

Another grammar Nazi

Re:He would be right at home on slashdot

[Seumas]

Let me correct that for you.

Another grammar Nazi.

Re:He would be right at home on slashdot

[elrous0]

Fucking top-poster

Re:He would be right at home on slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

Tuesday last

Re:He would be right at home on slashdot

[Rei]

Perhaps they could ask The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks for some locations to fix. ;) My favorites are this and this.

Re:He would be right at home on slashdot

[The Archon V2.0]

I bow to your superior grammar Nazism.

Well, superiority is one of the things Nazis always go on about....

Re:He would be right at home on slashdot

[Abstrackt]

Fucking top-poster

, how do they work?

less / fewer

[flynt]

I hope they went to every store with an "express lane for less than 10 items". Shudder.

Re:less / fewer

[AllergicToMilk]

And, most people fail to realize that this is a problem because the word should be "fewer" not "less". Double shudder.

Re:less / fewer

[severoon]

From dictionary.com: "Even though less has been used before plural nouns ( less words; less men ) since the time of King Alfred, many modern usage guides say that only fewer can be used in such contexts. Less, they say, should modify singular mass nouns ( less sugar; less money ) and singular abstract nouns ( less honesty; less love ). It should modify plural nouns only when they suggest combination into a unit, group, or aggregation: less than $50 (a sum of money); less than three miles (a unit of distance). With plural nouns specifying individuals or readily distinguishable units, the guides say that fewer is the only proper choice: fewer words; fewer men; no fewer than 31 of the 50 states."

It's no surprise that people don't understand this distinction. Look at the confusion around the word data, which has become popular over the last decade or two to treat as a plural ("The data suggest..." when it should be "The data suggests..."). I'm quite certain that many people will protest this post, that "data" is plural, and treating it as such is correct.

If "data" is plural, then so are the following: sugar, information, hair, media, agenda... The agenda are prepared. My hair are blonde.

Idiots. :-p

Re:less / fewer

[uglyduckling]

"Data" is plural; the singular is "datum". Just like errata and erratum. In a sense you're right, "data" has turned into a popular word and its meaning is changing, but trying to claim that it has recently become popular to use it as plural is completely wrong; rather the reverse is true.

Re:less / fewer

[severoon]

Not like errata and erratum. Common usage of errata maintains the separate identity of the individual items within the group: We've collected errata for this textbook over a 12 month period. (Each erratum trickled in from readers; the entire set didn't show up all at once.) On the other hand, if you refer to them as a group: The errata is ready for formatting. (Each individual item is not going to be formatted independently—the formatting will be applied to the errata as a whole, all at once. The implied measure word is "section," as in the errata section of a book that is to be formatted.)

Data is actually more like agenda and media.

:->

Typo or ...

[jaymz666]

NPR really needs to learn the difference between a typo (i.e. a slip of the finger) and bad spelling and grammar.

Kind of douchey.

[Seumas]

Excessive abuse of grammar is frustrating and it can be enjoyable on occasion to correct it, but something about these guys just make me view them as douches. I'm not surprised that it was featured on NPR, of all places.

Of all the things to obsess over and waste your time "contributing" to in this world, correcting government signs is going to be it? Really?!

Re:Kind of douchey.

[Seumas]

I didn't really count that as part of the benefit, since I have a general distaste for "random guy starts up popular blogspot page and turns it into a book!" stuff. Imagine how much that must piss off a real author with something they're having a hard time publishing? Damn.

Re:Kind of douchey.

[MarkGriz]

Kind of? More like supremely...

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/2008/08/22/20080822grammarcops0822.html

On March 28, while at Desert View Watchtower on the South Rim, they used a white-out product and a permanent marker to deface a sign painted more than 60 years ago by artist Mary Colter. The sign, a National Historic Landmark, was considered unique and irreplaceable, according to Sandy Raynor, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Phoenix.

Re:Kind of douchey.

[magarity]

Imagine how much that must piss off a real author with something they're having a hard time publishing
 
What's the difference between a real author whose book isn't published and a random guy whose book is published?
 
One of them is a real author.

Re:Kind of douchey.

[Monchanger]

Kind of? More like supremely...

The sign, a National Historic Landmark

Really? Is anyone stupid enough to believe a sign could be a national historic landmark?

No, genius. The sign is attached to the actual landmark, which the sign is about: the Desert View Watchtower. Mary Colter, who painted the sign wasn't an artist but an architect. Facts kind of matter, even when they're about grammar nazis.

Is it stupid to do their thing on a sign with actual importance? Duh... The thing is nobody but you assumes they did that knowing it wasn't just a poorly-written sign produced by the park service.

Re:Kind of douchey.

[swillden]

Really? Is anyone stupid enough to believe a sign could be a national historic landmark?

I dunno. A sign, hand-painted 60 years ago by the architect who designed the landmark seems worthy of preservation itself.

The thing is nobody but you assumes they did that knowing it wasn't just a poorly-written sign produced by the park service.

Not knowing doesn't reduce the impact of their vandalism.

should pay for that pro spell check and not use th

[Joe The Dragon]

should of payed for that pro spell check and not use the free build in one.

Sigh...

[The Spoonman]

Language is about communication, it's not about the RULES of grammar. Yes, we have arbitrarily decided rules as to what gets an apostrophe and how things are spelled and so on...failing to follow this rule or that at any given time doesn't often hinder the communication. If someone says to me "pimipin' ain't easy", I get what they said. I don' t need them make sure they put the "g" on the end or use "isn't" instead of "ain't". Thanks to my abhorently abusive Catholic school education, I still cringe when I see someone's written "Thank's for shopping at our store's!", but I don't feel the need to correct them. That would just be douchey. You know...like these two guys.

Re:Sigh...

[flerchin]

What is pimiping?

Re:Sigh...

[clarkkent09]

but it's totally ok to complain about someone who complains about someone who complains about bad grammar.

Re:Slashdot

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Their heads would explode reading Slashdot.

You loose. Slashdot has it's own set of rules. Besides, you should of said "asplode".

youryou'retheirtherethey're

[precariousgray]

Note: it's not a typo if the error was borne of ignorance.

Re:Life imitates art

[JTsyo]

Probably Farside.

You ain't seen nothing...

[sydneyfong]

http://imgur.com/4R1D4

Welcome to China.

A more accurate translation would be "dry fried duck", but I suppose there's a more elegant translation.

---

http://blog-imgs-38.fc2.com/o/t/t/ottovon/_20gb601.jpg
Welcome to Hong Kong -- this one actually made it to local news headlines for its hilarity.

[ Bold/top line is original text, middle line is google's translations (which sucks), and bottom is what it really means ]

Re:Slashdot

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Can you use the word "whoosh" in a sentence?

Isn't this a simpler issue?

[natehoy]

If you own a sign, it's yours. You get to alter it, deface it, replace it, do whatever you want with it.

If you don't own a sign, and don't have permission of the owner or some specific sign-maintaining authority, then altering it is an act of vandalism. Your intent is irrelevant. It's not your sign. Don't like it? Too bad. Offer the sign owner some money to replace the sign with one that is to your liking, and maybe they'll take you up on it.

There's a really old-looking hand-carved sign at Yellowstone that talks about the dangers of getting too close to critters. IIRC it's near Old Faithful, but it's been about 10 years since I've been there, so my memory might be bad. The wood is well-weathered, the carving is pretty good, and it's obviously a matter of some effort on the part of the park service to preserve it. Unfortunately, it has a single spelling error (reversal of two letters in a word), and there are various correction marks that have been scratched and scrawled into it over the years that really ruin the look of the sign.

If it's not yours and you haven't been put in charge of maintaining it, keep your markers and tools off it. Please.

Re:Isn't this a simpler issue?

[gartenbauer]

The carver must have been using the spell checker in the wood processor

Website gone??

[BobMcD]

I'm looking for the cited 'TEAL' website, and everything I click on leads me to their book. I don't give a crap about the book, I just want to see photos of their work.

Re:Slashdot

[ElKry]

"Whoosh", wrote the slashdotter with a smile on his face, feeling superior to the parent poster but slightly uneasy, for he was haunted by the possibility of nourishing a troll instead of educating the masses.

Re:Communication

[Phrogman]

Like it or not, I can attest to the fact that I often mentally judge someone by their speech if I am talking to them, or by their spelling and punctuation if I am reading their writing. I am sure I am hardly alone. If they lack the ability to compose a coherent sentence, or the decency to use a spell checker, and have no concept of grammatical formations, then I am inclined to judge them as uneducated, ignorant or ill-informed, and I tend to disregard whatever it was that they were trying to communicate. Now, I grant you that sometimes one might type "Pimpin' ain't easy" for the effect - but the intention is to imply someone who is a lower-class, uneducated and possibly not very bright individual. If you regularly communicate in a similar style, you will look equally lower-class, uneducated and possibly not very bright. In other words, its a matter of communication. If you communicate poorly, you tend to be ignored, and in my opinion whatever you have to say matters less.

If I am reading forum posts and I come across a post that is utterly incoherent, misspelled, or contains a lot of grammatical errors, I skip it. That person has failed to get whatever point they were trying to make across to me at least, and likely others. If you want to be given attention, and your opinions to be given any consideration, learn to communicate using proper grammar, spelling etc. Failure to do so simply makes you look like an idiot.

Now, unleash the Grammar Nazis to let me know where I have erred in my post. I tried to be correct throughout, but I am sure I have made at least one mistake :)

Re:How to reach them

[Flea of Pain]

My personal favourite was at a fast food Chinese place. The sign? "No. MSG"

I took that to mean that if you asked a question the answer would be "No." Followed by "MSG"

Eg. "Do you use healthy preservatives in your food?" "No. MSG"

BS

[Estanislao Mart�nez]

Consider the missing comma here: "Mary had freckles on her but we liked her anyway." Without the comma, one could infer that Mary's ass was speckled.

That's nonsense on several counts.

1. But is spelled differently than butt.
2. No comma is necessary in sentences like your example. By which I mean you're going to find plenty of examples of excellent writers routinely dispensing with the comma in parallel grammatical structures.
3. If the sentence was spoken, intonation would make it quite clear what was meant. The pitch on the but would be higher than butt.
4. Pretty much any argument about "bad grammar" that's based on the ambiguity of a constructed example sentence presented without any context where it would be used is bullshit. Context routinely disambiguates language.

Bullshit.

[Estanislao Mart�nez]

And, most people fail to realize that this is a problem because the word should be "fewer" not "less".

So, come on, explain to my why this is (allegedly) so. Explanations that won't be accepted:

• Because some dude made up a rule that says so.
• Any explanation that consists of simply restating the rule in question in complicated and impressive-sounding language that may or may not betray the fact that the explainer has never been to a Linguistics 101 course.

Re:Bullshit.

[lgw]

If you're actually interested: fewer relates to countable nouns, less to uncountable. Less water, fewer glasses. "Less glasses" sounds as wrong as "fewer water".

Of course, few people read edited prose these days, and so most lack the "ear" for poor usage. It will be an odd time for language, with almost everyone literate but not reading books.

Re:Bullshit.

[adonoman]

Because it's convention. Why do we use the word "water" to mean that liquidy stuff you find in lakes? Why does "the" refer to a specific instance of an entity and "a" applies to any given instance of an entity? Words have meanings because that's how language works. We use "less" to indicate relative positions on a continuous scale. We use "fewer" to indicate relative positions on a discrete scale. Why? Because that's how it's been done since the 12th century. On the other, English in particular is a very fluid language - use whichever word you please. Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Slashdot

[rjstanford]

"Whoosh", wrote the slashdotter with a smile on his face, feeling superior to the parent poster but slightly uneasy, for he was haunted by the possibility of nourishing a troll instead of educating the masses.

But now we're going to have to have a debate on whether American or British rules for comma placement near a set of quotation marks are ideal, especially since you used double-quotes (traditionally American) with the British comma placement. I applaud your multiculturalism.

expresso and missing words

[billstewart]

They were just too hopped up on the caffeine to get it right the first time, and then something shiny went by.

More annoying in my opinion

[mfraz74]

Is the amount of words spelt the American way here in the UK. For example words ending in ize instead of ise, color, tire and gotten.

You may want to finish that quote.

[Estanislao Mart�nez]

From dictionary.com: "Even though less has been used before plural nouns ( less words; less men ) since the time of King Alfred, many modern usage guides say that only fewer can be used in such contexts. Less, they say, should modify singular mass nouns ( less sugar; less money ) and singular abstract nouns ( less honesty; less love ). It should modify plural nouns only when they suggest combination into a unit, group, or aggregation: less than $50 (a sum of money); less than three miles (a unit of distance). With plural nouns specifying individuals or readily distinguishable units, the guides say that fewer is the only proper choice: fewer words; fewer men; no fewer than 31 of the 50 states."

You know, that quote continues. The next sentence after you cut it off: "Modern standard English practice does not reflect this distinction."

Note that they said standard. The entry is actually endorsing the use of constructions like less words and less men.

It's no surprise that people don't understand this distinction. Look at the confusion around the word data, which has become popular over the last decade or two to treat as a plural ("The data suggest..." when it should be "The data suggests..."). I'm quite certain that many people will protest this post, that "data" is plural, and treating it as such is correct.

Um, from dictionary.com: "data (noun): a pl. of datum." Yes, the very same source that you misleadingly cite as an authority above for less/fewer.

If "data" is plural, then so are the following: sugar, information, hair, media, agenda...

Care to actually argue why? I can't tell you how wrong you are about that unless you spell out why you think so.

Re:Slashdot

[Sir_Lewk]

I dropped the dish.
I dropped the dishes.

I dropped the fish.
I dropped the fish.

Different words act differently. In this case "it" seems to get an "s" sound for the same reason "cat" gets an "s" sound. Leaving out the "'" just because it is a pronoun is dumb.

Soy meat.

[Estanislao Mart�nez]

"Vegetarian chilli-con-carne" is no more an oxymoron that "soy meat" is. There are plenty of so-called intensional or non-intersective grammatical constructions, where modifying X with Y results in an expression that is not an X. A "fake Rolex" is not a Rolex; it's something that's pretending to be a Rolex. Likewise, "vegetarian chili con carne" is not chili con carne; it's a vegetarian dish that substitutes for chili con carne.

Re:Did you actually read my question?

[lgw]

As I suspected, you weren't actually interested, though other /. readers may be. If you have some point to make, you should make it, and not try to get me to play "guess what it has in its pocketses".

Re:Did you actually read my question?

[dotgain]

^ more internets to this man