It depends on whether you want to appear literate or not

[rapana1]

I'm starting to see a LOT of incorrect spelling and grammar sneaking into print ads in major newspapers and the like. Meanwhile, in the email I get from City Chic they had a picture of their new season "Crotchet jumper". Sigh.

[KatherineB]

I'm starting to see a LOT of incorrect spelling and grammar sneaking into print ads in major newspapers and the like. Meanwhile, in the email I get from City Chic they had a picture of their new season "Crotchet jumper". Sigh.

I'd quaver at the sight of that. Then again, I probably wouldn't spare it more than a minim's glance, so perhaps it wouldn't be so bad.

[Seshat]

As I said, not sure which is totally proper (or if American English has different rules than the Queen's English)

When I wrote professionally for a US publisher, I had to use the Chicago Book of Style. Which differs from what I was taught (Oxford style). I can verify that American and British English have different grammatical rules as well as different spellings.

However, the differences are only enough to make them two dialects of a common language; not two entirely different languages. We should be able to understand each other.

I'm starting to see a LOT of incorrect spelling and grammar sneaking into print ads in major newspapers and the like. Meanwhile, in the email I get from City Chic they had a picture of their new season "Crotchet jumper". Sigh.

I'm not sure I'd be able to breve* after laughing at that.


* Note for those without music history in their background: many ancient pieces used minims or even semibreves and breves as their base count (we use crotchets or quavers). In modern times, if we want an 8-crotchet note, we use two semibreves - one per bar, slurred. In ancient times, they often had 8-crotchet bars, so they'd use a breve. A breve is drawn as two semibereves, overlapping.

* Note 2: puns aren't as funny if you have to explain them.

[dalesys]

* Note 2: puns aren't as funny if you have to explain them.

Well, we can go all MJ and just "Beat It" out.

[Chromatix]

In my experience, breves are written as a semibreve flanked by pairs of vertical lines. And a "slur" that joins two notes of the same pitch is called a tie - so the two semibreves would be tied together to become equivalent to a breve.

Bizarrely enough, a lot of recent successful musicians are unable to read musical notation. They use modern "pattern" software instead, or play by ear, or just make it up as they go along.

[bunnyboy]

Even worse are the ones still under the mistaken impression that English is based on Latin. Therefor; one should never end a sentence with a preposition, like those nasty Germanic languages.

[Argabarga]

Misspelling bugs me mostly when it's clear that someone used the spell-checker and just took whatever the "first" option was.

Use of "loose" when "lose" was intended (or vice-versa) drives me to take big, ragged bites out of whatever I'm reading.

For some reason, a lot of folks seem to think that "trailer" is spelled "trailor", and this was a popular mistake even before texting made it possible for such mistakes to happen so often, some people thought that the correct spelling was wrong....

[PandaHat]

I wish I could play be ear. That would be an amazing skill.

Also there are (much fewer) differences between Scottish English and RP English. None of which I can remember at the minute so y'all just have to take my word for it.

[BeeMused]

Even worse are the ones still under the mistaken impression that English is based on Latin. Therefor; one should never end a sentence with a preposition, like those nasty Germanic languages.

Ah yes, the joys of prescriptive grammar vs descriptive grammar. The first grammarians were Latin trained monks, so they prescribed Latin grammar rules, since an infinitive in Latin is just one word, conservative English grammar still forbids the split infinitive.
Modern linguistic grammar theory is mostly descriptive, they watch how people write and speak (there is a huge difference between written and spoken language), next to nothing of this has reached school grammar, which is highly prescriptive. Non-linguistist see language as static and not really changing, which of course is wrong.
My own personal pet peeve with German is the spelling reform we had lately. How we spell things is by agreement and not some natural law... aaaaarrrrglll... I better stop ranting....

[Shalom]

Some colloquialisms are different. Slang's different. A rubber to a Brit means an eraser, to me it means a condom.

Well, both of them are used for rubbing, one way or the other...

* Note for those without music history in their background: many ancient pieces used minims or even semibreves and breves as their base count (we use crotchets or quavers). In modern times, if we want an 8-crotchet note, we use two semibreves - one per bar, slurred. In ancient times, they often had 8-crotchet bars, so they'd use a breve. A breve is drawn as two semibereves, overlapping.

For Americans:
semibreve = whole note = 𝅝
minim = half note = 𝅗𝅥 (no idea what font contains those. I don't have one here either.)
crotchet = quarter note = ♩
quaver = eighth note = ♪
demiquaver = sixteenth note = ♬

We didn't learn about breves and longas when I was taking lessons, oh, thirty-odd years ago. A whole note was as far as we ever got.

[Aethian]

For Americans:
semibreve = whole note = 𝅝
minim = half note = 𝅗𝅥 (no idea what font contains those. I don't have one here either.)

whole note = °
half note = ♭

[PepperElf]

So, he thought that it should have read "Library staffs"?

If so, Well, sure, if you'd been issued customer-beating sticks of wood, then yes, that would be correct.

Nope. That would be "staves".


On my ships we've had people play "grammar police" on some of the signs. Normally it's fine because the signs were usually wrong.* However once in a while the grammar-police actually got it wrong and tried correcting an accurate sign. IIRC the one time I saw it happen someone corrected the "fix" and left a note on the sign about it as well.



* seriously those were some pretty interesting failures. My favorites were a misspelled professionally printed copy of the Sailor's Creed and a misspelled sign advertising education opportunities.

[rapana1]

Just got a flyer from National Demonic Branded Pizza co.
It was entitled "Offering's".

[Seshat]

Even worse are the ones still under the mistaken impression that English is based on Latin. Therefor; one should never end a sentence with a preposition, like those nasty Germanic languages.

Like the classic example:

"What did you bring that book I didn't want to be read to out of up for?"

(Count the prepositions!)

[the lawsmeister]

Use of "loose" when "lose" was intended (or vice-versa) drives me to take big, ragged bites out of whatever I'm reading.

That irritates me as well.
Others that I seem to frequently see are:
Affect and Effect being used in place of each other
Insure & Ensure
They're, there and their.
and of course your and you're

Grammar: The difference between knowing your shit and knowing you're shit.

I'd use it at a signature but it would be rather ironic as I know that my grammar is poor at the best of times