NationStates Jolt Archive

My school district's webpage links to a 'calandar' for the year (should be spelt 'calendar.')

So is this an example of a lack of spelling skills among the people who are supposed to be teaching me? (Well, hiring the people to teach me, and making stupid decisions about how many teachers a school needs.)

Or ... on the internet, grammar and spelling seem to matter more to some people and less to others. Personally, I think it is terribly unprofessional to have spelling errors on your website (and I've occasionally refused to do business with places that have errors on their sites.) However, many people don't think it's that big of a deal, and some have even predicted that the tide of the way we spell is changing and that eventually, we will adapt to webspeak.

What do you think this means?





... or am I reading too much into one little mistake?

That's not too bad. Helsinki University claimed on its website for years that Finland is the 5th largest country in Europe when it actually is the 7th largest. Maybe they just forgot Russia and Ukraine. (Or any other of the larger ones)

My school district's webpage links to a 'calandar' for the year (should be spelt 'calendar.')

So is this an example of a lack of spelling skills among the people who are supposed to be teaching me? (Well, hiring the people to teach me, and making stupid decisions about how many teachers a school needs.)

Or ... on the internet, grammar and spelling seem to matter more to some people and less to others. Personally, I think it is terribly unprofessional to have spelling errors on your website (and I've occasionally refused to do business with places that have errors on their sites.) However, many people don't think it's that big of a deal, and some have even predicted that the tide of the way we spell is changing and that eventually, we will adapt to webspeak.

What do you think this means?





... or am I reading too much into one little mistake?
The beauti of English (and others like Geramn) is it is not regulated. It is able to be changed by the people who speak it and adapt to their needs. Adapting to webspeak can be a positive thing. Webspeak started from people's laziness to type out common phrases and long words. Webspeak could make how we talk more time efficient. Also webspeak isn't considered swearing (yet) and saying wtf won't get you in trouble. If you were to say what the fuck you might get push-ups or some other minor disciplin.

I think they hired someone to throw that site together, the guy (or gal) put everything he was given up there, but in the process misspelled calendar, and either no one proof read it or they missed the mistake too. Now the guy is gone cus he finished his job, and either no one has noticed, or no one knows how to fix it and it simply isnt worth hiring someone to fix a simple typo.

I tend to agree with you that it is wrong on a web-page to have spelling errors. I find it especially offensive on a permanent portion of the web-page. In a post on a bulletin board, like this, spelling is irrelevant as long as the meaning can be discerned, it is an informal communication. A web-page however is a formal communication and should adhere to the formal rules of the language. If someone cannot be bothered to use proper spelling on a web-page, what else can they not be bothered to do?

I tend to agree with you that it is wrong on a web-page to have spelling errors. I find it especially offensive on a permanent portion of the web-page. In a post on a bulletin board, like this, spelling is irrelevant as long as the meaning can be discerned, it is an informal communication. A web-page however is a formal communication and should adhere to the formal rules of the language. If someone cannot be bothered to use proper spelling on a web-page, what else can they not be bothered to do?
I disagree. Web designers tend to cost a lot of money to hire, have the worst set of instructions to follow, the odd mistake is going to happen. Also, with all the time the spent learning how to design a website they did not learn much about spelling. Sometimes the code used has spelling errors in it. The coding language I was exposed to in school had errors in its spelling: the word integer was spelt interger. How is bad spelling offensive? I can understand if the "b" in the word bigger was a "n" but other than that I do not get how it can be offensive.

..or no one knows how to fix it and it simply isnt worth hiring someone to fix a simple typo.
Big mistake. I know it happens but it shouldn't. The customer should always know how to make minor changes on webpages. Especially in text.

Dude, you think that's bad, check this (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/08/09/BAspelling09.DTL) out.

Can't blame that one on the internet...

I disagree. Web designers tend to cost a lot of money to hire, have the worst set of instructions to follow, the odd mistake is going to happen. Also, with all the time the spent learning how to design a website they did not learn much about spelling. Sometimes the code used has spelling errors in it. The coding language I was exposed to in school had errors in its spelling: the word integer was spelt interger. How is bad spelling offensive? I can understand if the "b" in the word bigger was a "n" but other than that I do not get how it can be offensive.I guess I can see your point, but I would like to point out that carpenters tend to cost a lot of money, have the worst set of instructions to follow, the odd mistake is going to happen. So next time the toilet in your new house doesn't work because someone forgot to attach apipe or the car you just bought blows a transmission after 50 miles because they forgot to put fluid in it at the factory or the plane your flying in crashes because some mechanic forgot to tighten a bolt, don't worry about it, just realize that mistakes will happen.

A web page is a way in which people/corporations present themselves to the world. It is (hopefully) created just for them, and presents exactly the parts of themselves that they wants the world to see and are willing to go to the effort to put out there for the world to see, the best parts of them. So when a web page has errors, it says to the world "Come see us, we're a bunch of folks who cannot be assed to do things right". If it happens to be the fault of the web page designer, it says "Look at us, we cannot even be bothered to check the work of people we hire and we hire people who cannot be bothered to do things right".

I have no problem with spelling in informal places, like web posts, situations where it is to be expected that the bother of making sure one's spelling is correct is not worth it. A web page, however, is not such an informal communication.

I guess I can see your point, but I would like to point out that carpenters tend to cost a lot of money, have the worst set of instructions to follow, the odd mistake is going to happen. So next time the toilet in your new house doesn't work because someone forgot to attach apipe or the car you just bought blows a transmission after 50 miles because they forgot to put fluid in it at the factory or the plane your flying in crashes because some mechanic forgot to tighten a bolt, don't worry about it, just realize that mistakes will happen.

A web page is a way in which people/corporations present themselves to the world. It is (hopefully) created just for them, and presents exactly the parts of themselves that they wants the world to see and are willing to go to the effort to put out there for the world to see, the best parts of them. So when a web page has errors, it says to the world "Come see us, we're a bunch of folks who cannot be assed to do things right". If it happens to be the fault of the web page designer, it says "Look at us, we cannot even be bothered to check the work of people we hire and we hire people who cannot be bothered to do things right".

I have no problem with spelling in informal places, like web posts, situations where it is to be expected that the bother of making sure one's spelling is correct is not worth it. A web page, however, is not such an informal communication.
I hope that spelling error on my toilets logo won't cause it to stop working.

I hope that spelling error on my toilets logo won't cause it to stop working.
I don't think the spelling error will, but if a company's willing to ship a toilet with their logo misspelled they are most likely willing to ship one that doesn't work.

I don't think the spelling error will, but if a company's willing to ship a toilet with their logo misspelled they are most likely willing to ship one that doesn't work.

I had a watch that was 'wate' resistant for a few months. I also had to reset the time every few hours because it lost 2 minutes every hour.

Dude, you think that's bad, check this (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/08/09/BAspelling09.DTL) out.

Can't blame that one on the internet...


*grin* I love it. And then I realised that I haven't talked to my friend in Livermore in a long time.

I had a watch that was 'wate' resistant for a few months. I also had to reset the time every few hours because it lost 2 minutes every hour. LOL, a fine example of what poor spelling indicates. Someone who cannot be bothered to check that wate is spelled correctly certainly cannot be bothered to be sure there are 58 minutes in an hour.

I tend to agree with you that it is wrong on a web-page to have spelling errors. I find it especially offensive on a permanent portion of the web-page. In a post on a bulletin board, like this, spelling is irrelevant as long as the meaning can be discerned, it is an informal communication. A web-page however is a formal communication and should adhere to the formal rules of the language. If someone cannot be bothered to use proper spelling on a web-page, what else can they not be bothered to do?

Exactly. A board is one thing - some people have learning disorders, some people don't speak english well, some people are lazy. That's fine and it seems a bit silly to correct someone here (although I will if they're attacking me and I'm cranky.) But a website should be a reflection of the quality of their work. Hell, even the carnie's website has proper spelling throughout. Although they also claim to do drug tests, even though I've seen their carnies shooting up on the job...

The school system is crap. Thanks to the teacher's unions, the schools cant even fire the teachers that cant spell (seriously, I read about it in Readers Digest). The quality of education here in Oregon is so terrible that my parents pulled me and my sister out of school. We are now both hhomeschooled, and I would like to point out that I am currently testing better than college students.

The school system is crap. Thanks to the teacher's unions, the schools cant even fire the teachers that cant spell (seriously, I read about it in Readers Digest). The quality of education here in Oregon is so terrible that my parents pulled me and my sister out of school. We are now both homeschooled, and I would like to point out that I am currently testing better than college students.


I homeschooled for a while, but it didn't work out too well. I don't get along well enough with my mom for it to work. In my experience, the teachers are good at teaching, and if their spelling sucks, I can correct them and they can go on teaching what they're good at teaching. On the other hand, if your spelling sucks and your teacher's spelling sucks...

I think one problem is that teachers don't get paid enough and they just sort of give up on things unless they're really passionate about it.