Saturday, July 29, 2006

Proposal for the Internet

When a user inputs the English word 'loose', every web page should provide links to the definitions of loose and lose, with a firm statement like 'For the love of the rest of the English speaking world, make sure you are using the correct word'. Some example responses to an online article about the maker of Lego:

  • How does a company that makes plastic bricks loose over 200 million in one year?
  • ... kids loose interest around age 10-12 if not before.
  • So, it's no surprise that LEGO looses ground.

How on Earth can so many people get it wrong? Grrr.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm afraid you've lost the battle with correct spelling. Just accept it.
(spelling corrected by editor).

Anonymous said...

R all spwelling mysteaks gong 2 b fiexed?

Anonymous said...

Sorry I inflicted you with one of my pet hates. A test was recently done on high school students in NSW who failed miserably. All blamed spell check but that doesn't check if you have the right word. I still can't "accept it".

Anonymous said...

TYPOGLYCEMIA
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt!

Anonymous said...

On a side note of the fact that the human mind reads a word as a whole. I watched a documentary that compared males and females and their ability to read misspelled words. Turns out, females do it much more rapidly than males do. The experiment was with acting students who were training to be news anchors. Each individual would need to read from a teleprompter and their number of stops were tracked. Females tended to read things very smoothly while the males had a bit of trouble. Thought that was an interesting fact.

Anonymous said...

You should try marking the homework of teenagers who send millions of text messages in their spare time. "U said I waz sposed 2..." etc. Grrr.