Poll: Does bad spelling on the internet bother you?

[EagleEye901]

It depends, if some one makes one or two spelling mistakes, I don't care, people make mistakes. When the poor spelling is so bad you have to read it more than once, then it's sort of irritating. In both cases I just move one with out comment. The only time I really comment on spelling is when the person is insulting me, while making numerous spelling mistakes, because that's hilarious.

Good sir, you have summed up my internet life right there.

 

[Helios_(DEL)]

Not if i can understand it, and that it isnt text speach for example(nice 2 c u).

 

[Del-Toro]

There's no option for "yes, but only because it's managed to spill out into real life". You know, the problem some of us have with everything from the internet.

 

[Vonnis]

Yes it does. When I read a post with atrocious spelling, grammar and punctuation, I tend to imagine the poster speaking the same way he types, which leads me to conclude he is borderline retarded. Harsh? Possibly, but English isn't a particularly difficult language to learn, and if you know you suck at it the very least you could do is use a spell checker.
The argument "Not everyone is a native English speaker" doesn't fly either. I'm not a native English speaker myself, and if you really suck at English you should just stick to sites in your own language.

 

[Farther than stars]

There's no option for "yes, but only because it's managed to spill out into real life". You know, the problem some of us have with everything from the internet.

I've actually heard that complaint here a fair bit, so it seems to be a pretty big focus for concern.
As to the whole option business, I did in fact have a couple more options I would have liked to add, but sadly was only given eight. At least I guess it means the poll didn't become too complex to answer (with overlapping answers in some cases).
I probably wouldn't have added that one though, because the meaning of this poll particularly was to assess how much it annoys you or how much you are against it, not your reasons why you are / it does. After all the comments section has left a large space open for adding personal thoughts to the discussion (like you did in yours).

 

[DustyDrB]

I think it's weird that people here can't spell "definitely". I see them say "defiantly" (which is a word, but not even close in meaning to the word you're trying to conjure) or "definately" (not a word) all the time.

 

[Farther than stars]

I am dyslexic so I am bias on this topic, but I want to mention something related to this topic that drives me nuts. When I tell people that I am dyslexic and they say 'well you just have to try', and my reaction to this is normally 'don't you think that I do'. I look over my post and try and get rid of all the red squiggly lines but because of my dyslexia I don't really notice that some of the bigger words that I use are misspelled and are actually a different word entirely. On another side note I have a grammar nazi friend who also goes on this sight.

It's nice to hear the input of someone with this disability, since this case of online spelling must be very different to you than to most people. I've actually heard someone else with dyslexia say that having a spelling checker has actually proven as a major factor in overcoming his disability, making it affect him a lot less than it used to.
And you seem to be making a real effort to make your posts readable as well and I have to say it's working. It's actually better than quite a lot of the stuff I've seen out there and better by far than most of the lines you read in your average YouTube thread. In fact, if you hadn't said you're dyslexic, then I probably wouldn't have noticed.
I wonder how you feel about reading other people's texts though, because I've also heard researchers say that chat language being mainly about simplifying words, it has actually made reading online easier for some dyslexics. I'm just wondering what your outlook is on that.

 

[Farther than stars]

I find it ironic how you say "lazy mistakes like mistaking there for theyre."
APOSTROPHE'D.
I think that replies the poll, too.

EDIT: Oh wait, I'm bad at getting jokes. Sorry. Anyhow, it bothers me a little bit. If it's readable, I'm fine with it, but usually, it isn't. Especially not if you use a random amount of periods to make it seem like you're taking a pause.
You know, like "and then i went to the car............ and sat in the car.........." and so on.

Doesn't make it any less ironic though.
I heard what you're saying about the thing with periods and personally I honestly don't see a reason for using so many either, although I do use the classic three periods from time to time to illustrate a natural pause which, well... you simply cannot bring across in words, or at least not with the sentiment behind it which you intended to give.

 

[trollnystan]

SNIP

Well, I promised I'd come back to read your post properly, so I did. I very much value your input. You seem to have brought some interesting thoughts to the conversation. That percentage thing is of course only an indication of how communication works and not an exact science, but if I would make an equivalent I'd probably say it's 70% spelling (and punctuation), 20% grammar and 10% your message.
After all, although grammar is important, it does tend to come more naturally than spelling. And when someone has perfect grammar, but ignores their spelling completely, their typing looks a lot less professional than someone who uses perfect spelling, but ends their sentence in a preposition (just to give an example).

Put like that I agree with you. I was tired (excuses excuses...) when I wrote mine so I obviously didn't think it through.

The percentage thing is from an Eddie Izzard stand-up so no, it's not an exact science. But I've found it to be pretty accurate nonetheless. If you look and sound confident, people tend to listen to you and even agree with you even if what you're saying is utter bullshit.

The same with spelling, grammar and punctuation. If you consistently fail at those you may look and sound like an immature kid or uneducated, regardless of what you're trying to say. If combined with ALL CAPS WRITING ALL THE TIME, well... *shudder*

 

[nuba km]

I am dyslexic so I am bias on this topic, but I want to mention something related to this topic that drives me nuts. When I tell people that I am dyslexic and they say 'well you just have to try', and my reaction to this is normally 'don't you think that I do'. I look over my post and try and get rid of all the red squiggly lines but because of my dyslexia I don't really notice that some of the bigger words that I use are misspelled and are actually a different word entirely. On another side note I have a grammar nazi friend who also goes on this sight.

It's nice to hear the input of someone with this disability, since this case of online spelling must be very different to you than to most people. I've actually heard someone else with dyslexia say that having a spelling checker has actually proven as a major factor in overcoming his disability, making it affect him a lot less than it used to.
And you seem to be making a real effort to make your posts readable as well and I have to say it's working. It's actually better than quite a lot of the stuff I've seen out there and better by far than most of the lines you read in your average YouTube thread. In fact, if you hadn't said you're dyslexic, then I probably wouldn't have noticed.
I wonder how you feel about reading other people's texts though, because I've also heard researchers say that chat language being mainly about simplifying words, it has actually made reading online easier for some dyslexics. I'm just wondering what your outlook is on that.

Like I often have to say to my grammar nazi friend 'Language (both written and spoken) has been invented in order to bring a point across, so as long as that point is made language has achieved its goal' (just like to say this is not the first time I have quoted myself), in short I don't really care about grammar and spelling as long as I understand what the person is trying to say/write. This is also why I get irritated when I see people trying to make everything have 100% perfect grammar and spelling as a sentence such as 'pandas eat shoots and leaves' is pretty self explanatory and having the comma in their by accident won't make people think that pandas are some sort of fast food murderers.

 

[faceless chick]

annoys the hell out of me.
after 4 years of being scolded for every mistake and for always using american english (my teacher taught us british english lol),seeing that 80% of people can't tell "your" from "you're" makes me wonder how america can even boast having english as its native tongue.

seriously, at least for me, it's my 3rd language, you guys have a big problem here.

 

[Farther than stars]

annoys the hell out of me.
after 4 years of being scolded for every mistake and for always using american english (my teacher taught us british english lol),seeing that 80% of people can't tell "your" from "you're" makes me wonder how america can even boast having english as its native tongue.

seriously, at least for me, it's my 3rd language, you guys have a big problem here.

Obviously you're not American, so I thought I should point this out to you. The U.S. doesn't actually have an official language. It's one of the minor idiosyncracies which American politics simply cannot get over.
This has multiple reasons, one of the most pragmatic ones being that more than 10% of people in the U.S. speak Spanish at home and as their first language (being of Mexican ancestry) and almost all Mexican immigrants only speak Spanish. One of the idealistic reasons is that there are Native American languages which were technically there first, before the colonists settled in.
So yeah... You can't really penalise the U.S. for boasting English as its native language when it doesn't. Just saying.

 

[faceless chick]

annoys the hell out of me.
after 4 years of being scolded for every mistake and for always using american english (my teacher taught us british english lol),seeing that 80% of people can't tell "your" from "you're" makes me wonder how america can even boast having english as its native tongue.

seriously, at least for me, it's my 3rd language, you guys have a big problem here.

Obviously you're not American, so I thought I should point this out to you. The U.S. doesn't actually have an official language. It's one of the minor idiosyncracies which American politics simply cannot get over.
This has multiple reasons, one of the most pragmatic ones being that more than 10% of people in the U.S. speak Spanish at home and as their first language (being of Mexican ancestry) and almost all Mexican immigrants only speak Spanish. One of the idealistic reasons is that there are Native American languages which were technically there first, before the colonists settled in.
So yeah... You can't really penalise the U.S. for boasting English as its native language when it doesn't. Just saying.

then americans should stop asking( actually forcing) everyone else to speak english.
and don't say it's not true, you know you do, on the internet, media, schools, foreign policies, immigrants etc.

 

[Farther than stars]

then americans should stop asking( actually forcing) everyone else to speak english.
and don't say it's not true, you know you do, on the internet, media, schools, foreign policies, immigrants etc.

That's a fair point. Although I think that has to do with convinience's sake. Also, I think you mean "you know they do".

 

[Ice Car]

Yes, if you aren't using punctuation correctly , I swear I'll punch you through your computer and shove your keyboard down your throat!

But no, really, I can tend to be quite the grammar/spelling nazi, but only when people do so A LOT throughout the post and it makes it almost unreadable...

 

[Rooster893]

It only really bothers me in fanfiction. Other than that, I don't mind it.

 

[SckizoBoy]

Like I often have to say to my grammar nazi friend 'Language (both written and spoken) has been invented in order to bring a point across, so as long as that point is made language has achieved its goal' (just like to say this is not the first time I have quoted myself), in short I don't really care about grammar and spelling as long as I understand what the person is trying to say/write. This is also why I get irritated when I see people trying to make everything have 100% perfect grammar and spelling as a sentence such as 'pandas eat shoots and leaves' is pretty self explanatory and having the comma in their by accident won't make people think that pandas are some sort of fast food murderers.

I'm going to sound like a total jerk when I say this but while that point you make is valid, language is a consensus based form of communication and there must be a high level of conformity for it to be able to carry out its functions well. Sure, even if there are misspellings or other grammatical errors (for whatever reason) the majority might be able to understand, but when continued and uncorrected indefinitely, this can lead to any combination of misconstruing of words, mispronunciation and permanent bastardisation. Granted, this is how lingual evolution works and the raison d'etre of etymology, but when verbal constructs change completely within a generation, it leaves a distinctly bad taste in the mouth (or at least my mouth). Case in point, the word 'gay'.

Moreover, with English as having a three-hundred-thousand word vocabulary, verbosity is not compatible with a high incident of mistakes in text for the simple reason of the prevalence of homonyms and homophones. Conscious editing of mistakes take up some time, especially when syntax needs to be changed, and even the edit may be incorrect.

...

I'll stop the trolling now. -_-

OT: It does annoy me, yes, but I cut slack to those that deserve it (however, as noted, I'm a jerk). Though I can't really remember correcting people that often around here, primarily because of the point made in what I quoted and do not wish to appear more of a jerk than I already am.

 

[GideonB]

As long as someone genuinely misspells the word and isn't just talking like dis wid al dis txt chat (badly done mind) it's all good imo