h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

(Thanks to New Scientist's Feedback column for the name of this law.)

It states that any post to an internet newsgroup or forum complaining about the grammar or spelling of another poster (often called a Spelling Flame) will always contain at least one spelling or grammatical error itself.

Shurely not!

Aside from the many postings to H2G2 that fall into this category, does this include those posters that refuse to use capital letters on formal words: "I" for i, etc?

Fruitbat

Unbelevable

I think that's a different case altogether. I was talking about the *complaints* inevitably having mistakes themselves.

General lack of spelling/punctuation/grammar on the Internet is something else. Although I do hate people who insist on not capitalising properly even though they know better, presumably because upper case implies a hierarchy (or something).

The worst offenders are those people who insist on spelling their names with no capitals, and insist on others following this convention. Way to go, railing against the evil, male-dominated hegemony of clear writing.

14t3r, d00dz. ()

> I think that's a different case altogether.

There are some countries in which you'd be shot for that.

AAAAAAaaaiiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
I have seen the light....http://www.h2g2.com/A180802

Hiya.

It's one of the Laws of Nature - preservation of the species

You can spell my name in any combination of capitals that you like, Jim. It's just that I am too lazy to hit the shift key.

Nicknames are fine, it's when people insist on having their name always spelled with lower case letters that it annoys me.

It wasn't anything personal, honest!

I try to always spell and capitalise correctly...but there are times when the fingers just give up completely! I have already been castigated for correcting the s/p mistakes of the resumes for the *Virtual Mayor of London* article!Why don't you drop over sometime and check out what fun we are having with this!
shazz

i must admit that i am one of the many who refuse to use proper capitalization and punctuation. in certain situations [ie, papers from my college days, etc] i would follow the preset grammatical rules [laws, as some literary groups prefer], but for most situations, i follow my own rules, much like the haphazard conglomeration of capital letters, uncapitalized letters, and signs often interchanged and used by those who consider themselves "3l337 4@ck3rZ". i find my style of capitalization [rather, non-capitalization] much easier, less stressful, and easier to read than most. i find capital letters largely, shall we say, unimportant [with the exception of stressing a particular WORD]. honestly, what function does a capital letter serve. it is supposed to stress the importance of the word it is beginning. who is to say that Algeria deserves a capital letter? i find it amusing that all people and all "proper" places are automatically granted this level of importance. i think a test should be created to apply for capital letter status. as a matter of fact, i think i will work on that. =] cheerio.

and go figure immediately after posting i find grammatical errors. i, shall we say, suck.

May I suggest sloppy usage of English in its written form has its origins in lazy kids whose mothers picked up discarded clothes for them.

you certainly may suggest that, but my mom smacked my behind with a small wooden horsehair broom when i didnt pick up my messes. so perhaps in my situation it IS a case of complete and utter rebellion, as she lives over two hours away and the broom broke about ten years ago, so i no longer fear the situation.

Are you studying medicine?

Another universal law. All doctors have atrocious handwriting

Very strange, but true. Does anyone know if doctors (of the medical variety, i.e. no PhD - HA!) get taught how to be illegible? I've always wondered.

surprisingly enough, i do not write in cursive. i print, also in all lowercase characters [over-using, i must confess, the ellipse "..."], with all of my characters as close to the same size as possible. i take pride in my handwriting. i think in many ways it resembles this font. i do not study medicine, though i wish i did because i would have so much money i would pay someone to write for me. and, finally, in my opinion docters write so illegibly because of high-stress levels and/or an overwhelming sense of importance. in my experience i have noticed that people of advanced social/work standing suffer from bad handwriting. i can only attribute this to stress and high ego levels, thought i havent given it much thought, so who knows? if anyone has a better idea, please feel free to contribute.

My husband has horrendous handwritting, but in his case it has always been so, and I think it arises from some sort of minor motor or nervous disorder - he just doesn't have the "fine" control.

This is unlikely to be true of most poor handwritting. I do know that illegible signatures are associated with people who sign their name alot (mine went from being highly readable to an illegible but very quick scrawl during a period of my life when I was signing large numbers of documents). Perhaps illegible handwritting is linked to the same sort of thing - a large volume linked with a need, or strong desire, to be quick?

I suppose You can put Capitals wherever You like. In Germany, for instance, all Nouns have Capitals. Not just the Proper Ones.

What really gets me is people who don't stop to consider that the reader has to make sense of what is written and don't bother with any punctuation. I was taught that these were supposed to be "breathing breaks" - if you couldn't read the sentence out loud comfortably you had to put some punctuation in. I favour brackets personally, and hyphens. They give the illusion of structure without actually slowing things down at all.

The best way if you're not sure is just to start a new paragraph. I for one find myself wanting to strangle people who expect me to read huge blocks of text without any breaks, punctuation, capitals or anthing else to distinguish their masterpiece from the deranged ramblings of a lazy mind.

So there.

(Is there a law that says that any forum shall immediately become sidetracked from the original point. Is the time taken proportional to the importance of the original message?)