Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 21:32:30 -0500 (EST)
From: "Keith F. Lynch" <kfl at KeithLynch.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
Subject: [WSFA] Top Posting, overquoting, grammatical errors, etc.
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

The big issue isn't top posting vs. bottom posting vs. side posting.
It's overquoting and garbled quoting.

One reason I'm reluctant to provide a digest option for this list,
i.e. an option to have all of the day's messages bundled together into
one big message, is because I just know that someone would include the
whole daily digest in their reply.  I've seen it too many times on
other lists.

One former subscriber to this list was notorious for not
distinguishing in any way between her text and the text she was
replying to, leading to confusion all around.

For a truly awful recent example of garbled quoting in rasff/rasfw, see
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.written/msg/be55a73254239daa

As for grammar and spelling, I think mine continues to improve.
Partly because whenever I'm in doubt, I can do a Google search of the
word or phrase.  Believe it or not, correct usages on the net always
outnumber incorrect usages.  Or at least I've never been able to find
any instance of a misspelled word that got more "hits" than the same
word correctly spelled.  (And if it did, then by what standard is it
wrong, since dictionaries are supposed to be descriptive, not
prescriptive?)

Wade and I have now produced ten WSFA Journals totaling 210 pages,
and as far as I know there's not a single misspelling or grammatical
error in any of them.  (Corrections eagerly solicited.)

Of course there's also the issue of the *wrong* word.  A common one
on the net is "loose" where "lose" is meant.  And of course the old
classics: principle/principal, capital/capitol, discrete/discreet,
compliment/complement, affect/effect, etc.  And the people who think
that the purpose of an apostrophe is to warn that an "s" is coming.

(I've also been seeing plenty of text which is simply missing all
apostrophes, or in which they've been replaced with random garbage.
I blame Microsoft.)

Fortunately I have a knack for nitpicking.  I know, for instance,
that it's "Hudson Bay," but "Hudson's Bay Company".  "Hard disk"
but "compact disc".

Is anyone hiring uncredentialed proofreaders?  Copy editors?  Fact
checkers?  I've got to start earning some money somehow.  And it
looks like the IT market for people without security clearances has
completely collapsed.  Thanks.