Discussion on:

10 flagrant grammar mistakes that make you look stupid

Do certain grammar flaws get under your skin or are you unconcerned about the typical mistakes you see in e-mails, discussion posts, and other communications? Is there a mistake you habitually make (and never seem to notice in time)?

There are good reasons to use abbreviated spellings. If the device you're using requires several key sequences to input a letter on a telephone number pad, or you're engaged in a quick conversation where response time is important, and the messages are strictly between sender and recipient, replacing letters or entire syllables with numbers or symbols makes sense.

There's no reason not to use conventional spelling when you are seated at a standard keyboard with no time pressure.

and, for some reason, Microsoft has made a guide about it:

http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/children/leetspeak.mspx

/children/.

"it was originally used by computer hackers and online gamers"

But I try to not use an elite dialect to communicate with the non-'l33t'. The exception is when they use it towards me, first.

I think the correct usage is "toward".

Granted, I do slip up from time to time.

These are the two non-words that cause me to foam at the mouth. How about regardless or irrespective and built, folks? Our IT department just loves to use "architected" lately. Pinched off would better describe some of their products.

mostly in a humorous context, not in a serious one.

"All your base are belong to us!" and such also have their places, common conversation is not one of those cases!

AND

gamers usually just fired off something quick to a display that could not be corrected.

this is how we got teh and l33t and pwned.

the 3 and the p are near the e and the o, respectively.

Real geeks do not speak 13375p34k, real hackers even more so. The people who brought 13375p34k to the world are the crackers and pre-voice chat gamers who couldn't be bothered to type properly, and still can't.

The worst thing is that this kind of illiteracy is spreading into the so-called "professional" world, with IT people, doctors, lawyers and worst of all, television announcers and news reporters all making Roman Moronie sound like a fluent enunciator by comparison.

That's the fargin' truth!

Actually, it came about as a means of creating "unhackable" passwords that were easy to remember. Of course, no password has ever been unhackable, and cracking software now includes most of the number/letter translations. I even ran across one that substitues @ for the letters "at" as well as "a", and & for the letters "and".

I absolutely HATE when people use LOL. Especially when they use it after almost every sentence. Not only is it way overused, but half of the time it's not used properly. It's really annoying. "I went shopping today, lol. What are your plans for the evening, anything good, lol?"... sigh.

Children??

wtf? n00b! m4d l33t sk1llz roxx0rz!!!!!!11!!!!


Sorry, only kidding. Completely agree.
I saw a documentary a month or so ago here in the UK, about the state of English taught in schools. They showed one girl, probably about 11 or 12 I think, and she wrote an essay almost entirely as she would if she was texting someone on her mobile. Horrendous!

I think the main problem is that all these variations on the language, like texting and leetspeak, probably do have their place in certain situations, on a phone when you have only 160 characters to play with, or on-line gaming, to 'fit in' (?). But now they're using these shortcuts in everyday life. And yes, quite often it does make the people look stupid.

THER IS TO MANY IDOTS OUT THEIR MISSPSELLING WERDS IN EMAL. AND SUM EVEN USE ALLL CAPS

I agree, does make people look stupid, it is used to often and in areas where it shouldn't be used.
I protest not to use it myself, as my grammer isn't 100%, until I am perfect at it, then I will start abbreviating here and there. But even on sms messages I still type out the full text, including MSN Messenger, etc. Except for gestures like LOL, I don't mind that.
Regards,
Jim

I agree, Bizzo. Language and culture, I think, have an impact (should it've been 'affect') on the way we write. Also in an organizational context, when superiors seem to flaunt basic grammar rules, employees lower down the order tend to follow suit.

Unfortunately you seem to have fallen foul of the very symptom under discussion - I suspect you meant 'flout' instead of "flaunt", which means 'to exhibit ostentatiously'.

How about the last line in the article? "you've got" as in, "If you've got a peeve of your own, share it in the discussion." To expand, that would be "If you have got..." Is "have got" any form of a verb we know?

And rahbm missed his/her own "fallen foul of" instead of "fallen afoul of". Possibly just a typo, but most people do get it wrong.

If you meant "Language and culture have an affect", the answer is NO!

If you meant "Language and culture affect the way we write", than YES, it could of
been.

Only kidding. I know. I intentionally violated #9 and #10 in that last line.

Does LOL mean:

Lots of Love
Lots of Luck
Laughing out-loud

?

>> when superiors seem to flaunt basic grammar
>> rules, employees lower down the order tend
>> to follow suit.

That is "flout" [to treat with contemptuous disregard] not
"flaunt" [to display or obtrude oneself to public notice] as you
used it ... Right?

Coming from a long line of educators, I have a terrible habit of correcting the grammar of any person unfortunate enough to misspeak with-in earshot; therefor I have learned that some folks have written their own version of websters . Now they 'cin jes say its in my own dictionary' and avoid education all together. By the way I speak better than I spell

I have seen LOL used for Lots of Love, Lots of Luck, Live Out Loud, and yes, occasionally even Laugh (or Laughing) Out Loud.

Maybe it should be redefined as Loss of Language.

The leetspeak isnt used in online gaming to 'fit in'. it developed because of a need to communicate detailed information in a very short space of time, i could give you a few examples if you want

Perhaps you could give us examples of capitalization of the first word of a sentence! This is why children aren't allowed to drive the family car until they learn certain rules! Feel free to communicate with your "My Space" kiddies in your fashion. Try to remember that grownups find that annoying, unprofessional, boorish and a tad bit recalcitrant.

The majority of people that claim to be l33t are lucky to run some script they found on the net.

Of course, they don't realize when they went to that warez site, they picked up a nice trojan that has turned THEM into zombies.

These people are to be ignored if they can not within the first few posts somewhere show that they ARE l33t instead of w33k.

Another thing, when you are cool, people say it to you.
When you are a Id10t, you say it to other people.

Abbreviations - if one is HIP! - is one thing, it does not condone improper articles.

Unless I got the word wrong, even by the new SMS standards ID1Ot (idiot) is spelled wrong. What effort, time or characters did you save? I have still not figured out the other 2 words.

I know a smattering of German. It is an extremely precise language. Just like in Sanskrit each noun has its own gender which you must remember. I have come to a conclusion that Germans are precise in their daily life & work because it has become second habit.

1) Did you mean to say that the article in front of 'idiot' should still have been 'an'? You didn't.

2) The point of leet (l33t, 1337) like that of any slang is of creating a community and make it a bit more difficult for outsiders to understand. The very name of this particular slang clearly indicates it's reserved to a few (self-)chosen ones. (Leet is short for 'elite' in case this escaped you.) Leet is not txt speak. The two overlap but they have different origins and purposes.

3) German is not the only language with genders for all common nouns. The precision you attribute to this should also be a characteristic of all who speak French, Spanish and Italian, to name a few. In fact I'm wondering if English is not in a minority of genderless languages.

If I have to stop to take time to try to translate your scribbles, I won't bother. I'll just move on to the next post. I really don't feel any need to be "leet".

Children bug me. Teens that is.

Reminds me of an old dog we had. The neighbors bred collies. Our aging male golden retriever got grumpy when there was a new litter of puppies around.

but I could be mistaken.

You are correct, you are mistaken. The original spelling is elite. Any other spelling meant not to convey the same meaning (a synonym) but the same word, can never be termed "original".

...that or your retriever was mad because they were ugly, long haired, noisy, worthless collies. Sorry! I just felt the need to take a cheapshot at dogs that find it fashionable to bark at the wind, or leaves, or silence, or.....

*insert evil grin here*

but I agree with you.

I know, I just ruined your day with that didn't I. ~lol~

dweeb-speak, only good for brainless id10ts

It could be Valley Girl talk..

you mean it isn't the same thing? complete and utter stupidity on the part of the person emitting the crap?

In a cheap, slutty kind of way. I've just got to get my wife a short blue plaid skirt and a white blouse, hold a couple of text books, and talk Valley Girl-ish. No knickers, of course.

Really? Is that the word we would use? Or, if by sexy, you mean utterly stupid and annoying, then I'm with you..

I thought they called them "draws" (drawers)in SC. But, while we're talking provocatve dress with a British accent, let's not forget suspenders.

braces. Which is different in the States, but I don't know what orthodontia is called in the UK. (This is not to imply it doesn't exist, just that my limited exposure doesn't tell me the term used in the "Olde Country".)

Braces hold up your trousers in the UK suspenders or galluses hold up your trousers, garters hold up your hose and your socks in US. In the US, knickers are worn by boys and in the UK knickers are lingerie--that may, in part, explain Benny Hill...If a man wears a 34" belt, what length suspenders does he wear? (You don't wear suspenders with a belt--that's paranoid behavior.) Maybe somebody could elaborate on kilts...or not.

You should see the differences between the Portuguese spoken/written in Brazil and in other countries (Portugal, Angola, Mozambique, etc.). There are striking differences in spelling, vocabulary and even in grammar - pronoun usage and gerunds are completely different, for example.

Sometimes, mutual comprehension can be difficult (especially in spoken language), and while it is possible to read several pages of a book in English without having a clue about the writer's nationality, it doesn't take us Brazilians more than a couple sentences to identify an author from Portugal.

Computer-related terminology, in particular, is COMPLETELY different, since new terms were absorbed separately and in different ways in Brazil and in Portugal. Just as an example, "to save a file" is salvar um arquivo in Brazil, but guardar um ficheiro in Portugal and the African Portuguese-speaking countries. In Brazil, we often employ computer terms in the original English form, while the Portuguese usually concoct some translation: a mouse is a mouse in Brazil too, but a rato ("rat") or even rat?o ("big rat" - go figure...) in Portugal and Africa.

When you see a list of languages supported by some particular software, you will notice that the Brazil and Portugal variants are always treated as separate languages and have different versions. Even Windows has separate versions for Brazil and Portugal.

Orthodontry = Dentistry in the UK...

Likewise "Podiatry" = Chiropody....

OK?

It could be Surfer Dudespeak! Duuuuuuude. Whenever I read on line reviews or comments at YouTube, Answer.com, Cnet, etc., I find the way people speak and write now absolutely appalling. They don't seem to grasp the concept of contractions, or know the correct usage of "two," "to," and "too," and substitute "da, diz and dat" for "the, this and that", just to name a few pet peeves. But without a doubt the worst offender is a co-worker in her 60's that should know better. "HIM and I talked it over..." or "I would go, EXCEPT TO THE FACT that..." I'll spare you the litany of grievances I have against her except for one more thing: I'm offering $10.00 to anyone who can explain this little gem she uses whenever she admits to making a mistake: "If I had a BRAIN, it'd be LONESOME!" There. That's it. Seven years I've been listening to that, and I have no idea what the hell it means. Anyone? Please?
Thanks for the opportunity to vent, I had nowhere else to turn.

First of all, it is not a co-worker "that" should know better. "Who" is the word you meant to use (if you wanted to be correct). As for the saying, "If I had a brain..." is an idiomatic expression. It means she thinks she is prone to making mistakes because she lacks intelligence usually associated with a brain. Send the $10.00 to my paypal account.