The correct way to respond to misspelling and grammar

[Mark McLeod]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Fixed that for ya.

An English major you are not.

[Dick Linn]

One can politely remonstrate the original poster for egregious errors or use a more graphic representation for those who learn visually:

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Mark McLeod

An English major you are not.

Just to be clear, I wasn't correcting grammar I was changing what he said to be more general. If we all were snobs and didn't answer questions until they were perfect half the questions (my bet would be more than half).

Again, just a small joke. Hope BobC understood I was just making a little bit of humor.

[Mark McLeod]

I understand the twist in direction you were trying to make and I sympathize, but your joke was overshadowed by the grammatical destruction it wrought, and in a grammar thread it fell flat.

Ms. Spelling and Ms. Grammar would be quite upset.

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Just to be clear, I wasn't correcting grammar I was changing what he said to be more general. If we all were snobs and didn't answer questions until they were perfect half the questions (my bet would be more than half).

Again, just a small joke. Hope BobC understood I was just making a little bit of humor.

It's all cool. We are not all rocket scientist and I think it is wrong if you know the answer to a question and you do not answer the question because of misspellings or wrong grammar you are wrong.

[Alivia]

Originally Posted by BobC

It's all cool. We are not all rocket scientist and I think it is wrong if you know the answer to a question and you do not answer the question because of misspellings or wrong grammar you are wrong.

I think that if you know the answer to a question, that means that you could understand the question that was asked (or in this case, written). This means that there was enough information given and grammar used that you know what was meant. I agree, in these instances, you should answer the question, and then maybe tack on at the end your thoughts the importance of grammar and how it would have been beneficial to all other CD-ers in reading the post. To refuse to answer a question that you know the answer to, purely based on grammatical errors, just seems juvenile to me, I guess.

Of course, this all changes if the effect of poor grammar and spelling/punctuation was so bad that you couldn't comprehend the post. In that case, a PM to the person should do the trick.

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by BobC

It's all cool. We are not all rocket scientist...

Speak for yourself.

-dave

p.s. And count me in with the majority. Refusing to answer a question until someone corrects their spelling and grammar mistakes seems more than a little pedantic and self-defeating. Is it incumbent upon the person with the questioning post to make their best efforts to communicate clearly? Of course. But for those that choose to provide an answer, it is also their responsibility to provide a useful, responsive and supportive reply that provides added value. Anything else is just noise.



.

Ah, how I love a barely veiled call out.

First, you seem to have misquoted something there:

If you ask this question there, and do it with proper spelling and word use, I'll respond with my rationale.

(The proper quote, taken from my outbox. At least keep things in context, if you're going to do this.)
The attempt was to encourage a discussion in open channel, rather than expecting a personalized explanation in private. The entire point of a forum is open discussion and archive information. Effectively a forum is a knowledge base. When you request clarification that would lead to normal conversation, it is not only polite, but very prudent to do it in open channel. After all, private messages are for private issues.

Now, since most of CD already thinks I'm an $@#$@#$@# (And I don't blame them, as it is quite hard to carry tonal inflection across the intertubes), I may as well move on to the issue of proper communication: In my field of work as well as the majority of the professional sector, it is impossible to carry out business without impeccable communication. A single misspelling reveals a lack of focus on detail, something that employer do not look favorably upon. My terse tone was a failed attempt at conveying this lesson (and an important one indeed, as it lost me a fairly decent contract due to a single spelling error...), apparently. I have always been raised on tough teaching, and I suppose it's a weakness of mine that I emulate that myself.

On to the claimed "refusal to reply." Keeping up on seventeen forums, six email accounts, and three IM accounts is a bit of an overload. Apologies for missing one post (I see now that you posted your question back in the forum, I'll head over there to answer it next), but there has simply been too much to keep up on.

[Alivia]

Originally Posted by CraigHickman

Ah, how I love a barely veiled call out.

First, you seem to have misquoted something there: (The proper quote, taken from my outbox. At least keep things in context, if you're going to do this.)
The attempt was to encourage a discussion in open channel, rather than expecting a personalized explanation in private. The entire point of a forum is open discussion and archive information. Effectively a forum is a knowledge base. When you request clarification that would lead to normal conversation, it is not only polite, but very prudent to do it in open channel. After all, private messages are for private issues.

Now, since most of CD already thinks I'm an $@#$@#$@# (And I don't blame them, as it is quite hard to carry tonal inflection across the intertubes), I may as well move on to the issue of proper communication: In my field of work as well as the majority of the professional sector, it is impossible to carry out business without impeccable communication. A single misspelling reveals a lack of focus on detail, something that employer do not look favorably upon. My terse tone was a failed attempt at conveying this lesson (and an important one indeed, as it lost me a fairly decent contract due to a single spelling error...), apparently. I have always been raised on tough teaching, and I suppose it's a weakness of mine that I emulate that myself.

On to the claimed "refusal to reply." Keeping up on seventeen forums, six email accounts, and three IM accounts is a bit of an overload. Apologies for missing one post (I see now that you posted your question back in the forum, I'll head over there to answer it next), but there has simply been too much to keep up on.

I do agree that proper context makes a difference, as the original post made your tone seem much more discourteous than it actually was, so I appreciate seeing the quote directly as it was. However, I must disagree about your statements on PMs. Many new users to CD use private messages as a way to ask questions of clarification, as they do not want to appear to be asking a "stupid question" (if those exist). If I was confused on something a person had said, I would probably private message them myself, especially if others seemed to understand perfectly well what the person had articulated. Furthermore, how does one decide if a matter is fit for communication in a forum or rather more fit in a private message? Are there guidelines for this? Perhaps this is what led to the original posters confusion, and why he felt the need to make a thread on the topic instead of PMing you again.

I couldn't agree with you more regarding communication. It is indeed very important to effectively communicate ones ideas and thoughts completely and concisely for others to take you seriously. It's a shame that a single misspelling error on your part lost you a contract, because all people DO make mistakes. However, if everyone based communication off of spelling or grammar errors in every instance, I shouldn't even be responding to your post right now. If we based communication off of this, people reading the thread might disregard what you have to say because you forgot to tack on a simple 's' on 'employers'. Is this right? Are your arguments null and void because you didn't catch this? Do I think you have a lack of focus in regards to CD? No. Of course not. Your message came across crystal clear, even with these minor errors.

I also would like to point out that CD is NOT a place of business. It's exactly what you said--a forum. A place to have open discussion. Where are the rules that say this discussion must have proper grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc., to be effective? If a person gets "reprimanded" (and I use that in the loosest sense of the word) for asking a question, I feel as if discussion can't be very open.

Just my .02. Again I'd like to thank you though, for posting the original message.

[Rion Atkinson]

I would like to say that Alivia is right to a point. I did indeed think that it was more appropriate to ask my question via a PM simply because I felt it was not a "big" issue and felt it was better asked in a PM than risk causing a huge problem in the thread.

I would also like to publicly apologize to Craig. I did not mean for it to be known he was the sender of the message, but certain post made that impossible to do. So I centralized the information given in those posts on my OP. I am sorry for that Craig. I was trying to address the way in which one should respond to misspellings and grammatical errors. It went about doing so in the wrong way.

Again. I apologize for this.

-Rion

(Oh. And Craig. On the Six email accounts, I recommend using Mozilla Thunderbird. I only have 2, but that's bow I keep track of them all. )

[Molten]

Originally Posted by Alivia

Furthermore, how does one decide if a matter is fit for communication in a forum or rather more fit in a private message? Are there guidelines for this?

If it's a question that might be asked by multiple people, post it in the forum. If it's something that might make people think, post it in the forum. If you think someone out there might find it interesting to read and somewhat educational, post it in the forum.

The PM is for personal/private messages. I generally only use it to say stuff that nobody would care to read or to get an explanation on something that was said. I have used it in the past as a form of IM and to teach Inventor(on one occasion) but even then the lessons were uploaded into the forum. Anything more then clarification or trivial conversation should probably go in main. Of course, this is a general approach. There will always be exceptions.

[JaneYoung]

All the good intentions of folks that are focused on misspelled words, grammar, and punctuation - just may be backfiring to some extent. I include myself in being a part of the reason that is behind the backfiring. We may be making it too uncomfortable for people to post here at the moment. Even worse, they may feel uncomfortable in an e-mail exchange. I am experiencing a little of that with some people whose opinions I value and trust, but who are feeling somewhat intimidated by all of this judgment.

At some point, even for me, this gets just too weird to deal with. I'm as excited as everyone else is regarding the upcoming season, but I hope I don't spend my time on CD creating an atmosphere that feels vise-like and hypercritical. If I do, please send me a pm and tell me to cut it out. This is a community made up of FIRSTers and people who support FIRST. I'd love to see some threads discussing that - building community, sharing information, networking. We're going to need that as more and more opportunities head our way over the next few months and years.

Jane

[JudyVandy]

All right, I've had it. My cup has overflown! (Is that the correct form of the verb???)

I am a curmudgeon about the proper form of written English, but I think that some of us have gone over the top here.

To be short and relatively sweet, refusing to answer an honest question which may have a few incidental grammar or spelling errors is not gracious.

We are human and very few of us have never made such mistakes. (Proofread some of the posts!)

In my opinion, a gentle reminder, done privately and addressing the specific situation, is the most gracious way to address an individual situation.

[BobC]

Originally Posted by JudyVandy

All right, I've had it. My cup has overflown! (Is that the correct form of the verb???)

I am a curmudgeon about the proper form of written English, but I think that some of us have gone over the top here.

To be short and relatively sweet, refusing to answer an honest question which may have a few incidental grammar or spelling errors is not gracious.

We are human and very few of us have never made such mistakes. (Proofread some of the posts!)

In my opinion, a gentle reminder, done privately and addressing the specific situation, is the most gracious way to address an individual situation.

I do not think I could of said it any better.

[Daniel_LaFleur]

These boards are for open communication.

Communication is an attempt to convey information, and gain an understanding between the sender and the recipients.

Grammar and spelling are nothing but the rules by which we gain that understanding.

When people decide not to follow those rules they run the risk of not being understood, and the information failing to be transferred. Since this writing is the only information we have to judge the writer, we may come to believe that that person is less intelligent (be that true or not, it will be the view of those who cannot understand his writing). Remember, you will be judged not only by what you write, but by how you write because it is all we have to go on.

The above, as normal, is JM(NS)HO.