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Internet, Web Enjoy One Final Day As Proper Nouns (go.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the grammar-Nazi dept.

An anonymous reader writes: The Internet and Web will be downgraded to "internet" and "web" tomorrow with the new edition of the AP Stylebook. Therefore, today marks their last day as proper nouns. The AP Stylebook is a manual that many journalists follow, offering a comprehensive guide to the usage of words, style, spelling and punctuation. "The argument for lowercasing Internet is that is has become wholly generic, like electricity and the telephone. It never was trademarked and is not based on any proper noun," writes Tom Kent, AP Standards Editor. "The best reason for capitalizing it in the past may have been that the term was new. At one point, we understand, 'Phonograph' was capitalized." The two names will join the likes of website (formerly Web site) and email (formerly e-mail).

5 of 211 comments (clear)

  1. I've never much cared for the AP guidelines by Red_Chaos1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This does not make sense to me. It's not just "a" Internet or "a" Web, they are "the" Internet and "the" Web. Unlike the Phonograph, there are not multiple vendors and multiple versions. It's all one very unique thing.

  2. Par for the course by Solandri · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "The argument for lowercasing Internet is that is has become wholly generic, like electricity and the telephone. It never was trademarked and is not based on any proper noun," writes Tom Kent, AP Standards Editor. "The best reason for capitalizing it in the past may have been that the term was new.

    Bozos like this is why general press coverage of technical and scientific stories still sucks. Rather than ask someone who knows for their informed opinion, they think they already know everything so can make decisions without having to ask.

    • An internet is any collection of interconnected networks. If a company connects its Los Angeles branch LAN with its New York branch LAN so they can share files, they now have an internet.
    • The Internet is the biggest grouping of such interconnected networks, which happens to span the globe (it didn't always). It is capitalized to distinguish it from other internets.

    Lowercasing 'Internet' makes about as much sense as lowercasing Associated Press, because the AP used to be new, but now there are several other associations of press corps.

  3. Re:typical commenter by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Wikipedia articles are that much better/reliable than Facebook posts?!

    YES

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  4. now Slashdot can make some adjustments . . . by swell · · Score: 2, Insightful

    How many of these words need capitals?
    Internet,
    Web
    Enjoy
    One
    Final
    Day
    As
    Proper
    Nouns

    --
    ...omphaloskepsis often...
  5. Who sets the standard? by Panoptes · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The AP Stylebook is an American product, written by and for American journalists. Saying that the Internet should henceforth be 'internet' is a parochial decision without global authority.

    In Britain the standard is set by the Oxford University Press, which has a rather longer and more illustrious history than the AP Stylebook. When the OUP and the Oxford English Dictionary declare that the word should not be capitalised, I shall accept their authority. Until then, it's the Internet for me.