Last Updated on: 8th June 2020, 05:40 am
It seems that people don’t care to check their own writing for errors anymore, and in places where they should. Lately, Steve and I have come across tons of instances of bad wording in newspaper headlines and ads. Um, is that a good idea?
One of the ads on our own site claimed to sell deaf products for deaf people. So the products are deaf? I didn’t know my run-of-the-mill toaster, clock, lamp and TV could hear me. That’s a scary thought. Another ad said it had visual impairment magnifiers. Why would anyone want to magnify their visual impairment? Wouldn’t they want to lessen it? That seems to be a common mistake, because on another site that I was critiquing, because they asked me to, it told people to enhance low vision. Doesn’t that mistake jump out at you as glaringly obvious? It didn’t just tap me on the shoulder to make its presence known, it screamed at me. Another ad said it had equipment for people with severe disabilites. What’s a disabilite? That one might only stand out to us because the computer is reading the screen and it doesn’t fill in the missing letters like people’s brains and eyes tend to do. But then another ad told me to behave my dog better. I think the publisher of that site may need an English lesson.
I see stuff in the newspaper, too, that surprises me. Our newspaper had to print corrections on corrections, for crying out loud. But headlines have gotten sloppy. One read, “Man killed in city crash.” Our city crashed? Into what? How did I miss it? And how come more people weren’t killed? Another read, “Police Officers Risk Lives to Save Man.” Whose lives did they risk? Why would they risk other people’s lives, and was it necessary? Did they risk my life and the paper was nice enough to inform me of it just now?
I’ve seen a few people’s websites that are supposed to be the core of their business, and they’re littered with typos. Do people not care about image anymore? Don’t they want to look professional? Remember the candy shoppe? I wouldn’t have guessed they were a reputable business based on the horrid typing. When I told them about this, they wanted me to catalogue all the errors and tell their webmaster. Uh, dude…isn’t it enough that I brought it to your attention? Now it’s your job to fix it. And don’t even get me started on my friend the artist’s website.
Don’t people proofread anymore? Don’t they care about being accurate? Or do they not have time? It’s pretty sad, because they’re making themselves look like fools.
