A Proof That blog reader sent me this one from her local newspaper. While consistency is good, the word should be “bred.”
And I couldn’t resist including this picture of real “pure bread” dogs because I knew someone would have done it already.
A friend sent this to me and it highlights the danger of “replace all” in documents. It is much safer to search and replace and stop at each instance to verify that it is indeed the word that should be replaced. Otherwise, you will end up with things like this and in a legal document, that could be very bad. So be careful and take the extra time to view the replacements you’re making.
I went to a craft fair this weekend and saw this bag. It made me chuckle because I could totally relate to having all kinds of stuff in my purse that wasn’t mine when my kids were little, and then I saw the misspelling.
A friend who was looking for a new house recently sent this one to me. There are so many problems with this, but I wanted to point out the most egregious. In addition to the random capitalizations, random word separation, words that would pass spell check but are not the right word, and using numbers instead of letters, the correct word for the circled word below should be “immaculate.”
A local judge shared this Twitter post from a Florida judge. This perfectly illustrates a couple of points that I feel are most important in our jobs. First, proofreading is really important–spell check would not have caught this error. Second, taking the time to look at your work product is well worth it. Take the time! Third, this is a really good example of the usefulness of a master caption file for every case–that is proofread multiple times–that contains information that attorneys don’t typically review like the case name, court name, attorney ID, service list, and judge name. This judge seems to have a sense of humor, but I’m pretty sure she will remember this in this case and with this lawyer and firm in the future. Always follow Judge Weston’s advice and don’t forget to proofread!
A friend sent this to me from his news feed from a local news station. My favorite part is the comment. 🙂
Remember that “who’s” is the contraction for “who is,” which is not a replacement for “whose,” which is the possessive case for “who.” Here are some examples:
I found this while I was making our annual tax credit donation to a local school. It looks like someone was in a hurry when they were putting together the information on the page. But this is really unacceptable to me. I set a much higher standard for learning institutions that are in charge of educating citizens. Misspelling “forensics” and “educators” means 20% of the choices in that dropdown menu are wrong. In addition, based on the other choices, it seems to me that the last one circled should be “Future Problem Solvers” unless there is only one member in that group solving all of the future problems. And speaking of only one member, apparently there is only one future physician in that club or it would be “Future Physicians’ Club.”
I came across this one as I was looking for some information. It seems that if you are talking about an important person who has spent a significant amount of time in your industry, you would try to make sure his name is correct and make sure it is spelled correctly throughout. That is important not only in journalism but in the work we do as well. The very first thing a client will notice is if their name is misspelled. Just take the time to make sure names are spelled correctly. Also, the apostrophe in the second place the name appears is unnecessary and sounds inappropriate in this article. It should say “Luongo (spelled correctly) has also . . ..”
My daughter sent me this breaking news story. Not only is the name of the town spelled incorrectly (it is SantA Fe), but what is a “wrap sheep”? I’m fairly certain that what they meant to say was “rap sheet,” which is defined on dictionary.com as “a record kept by law-enforcement authorities of a person’s arrests and convictions.” This one actually did make me giggle because I keep picturing a sheep in wrapping paper and a nice bow. Again, I feel like this is a result of news agencies rushing things through to be the first out with the story, but surely someone could have taken the time to proofread the headline. Take the time!
Queen Creek is a local town near me. The first picture is from a daily email I receive with headlines that you click on to get the whole story. The second is the headline from the actual story that you are directed to when you click the link in the email.
It is always important to proofread everything so that the information is correct everywhere.
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