Tuesday, 16 February 2016

Readers, Writers and ‘Typos’



Contributed by: Manycoloured Manley Nowaseb for SmartPost™ Daily


What will you do if you come across this sentence in a text message from a friend; “I don’t thing they will except me for this job cos…”?
What about if you happen to come across the same sentence in a text by your boss or someone who calls themselves a professional writer? Well, I would really love to see your comment posted under this article!
I started to write this article after noticing some verbal encounters between blog post commenters who clashed on ‘typos’ while communicating as I was browsing what I think are some remarkable writers blogs out there online. You guys are doing an awesome job blogging, please keep on writing because I bet you there are people out there reading. I guess this would have been my closing paragraph, nevertheless!


English grammar usage is diagnosed as a major dilemma over the years by many professional associations which care for English proper usage. 

Last year I was lucky to viewed a video at a friend’s place, about how diverse English use is in the US alone is, to the extent that some US citizens in some states actually speak (by word pronunciation) and write English different from many fellow statesmen in other regions of the US. 

In Africa and the rest of the world (mainly to the East) the situation is even worse to the degree that English is being classified by countries for example as; Nigerian English, Namibian English (also called Namglish), Indian English or Chinese English if I just mention a few  states which I know are part of such classifications. I guess such classifications are internationally accepted now because I came across the US English, UK English options many time while installing software.

I view that English is made the priority universal code of communication (so much so that you can even speak English with an alien Lol), yet many states still promote their individual national languages as official code of communication. Many internet users whom we the writers are considering are our prospective readers have less than half the standard of internationally satisfactory English.

The reason why I set the above perimeter is because I am trying to kind of bring harmony in context of acceptability of English use, mostly in writing on the internet, as well as to iron on issue of ‘typos’ (mistakes) made by individual blog commenters using English as well as how we who can, should be tolerant with those still learning the beautiful language. Please consider not all of us are masters of English therefore let us be patient with one another.

Now my writing partly is about the word ‘TYPO’ which I believe is misinterpreted by many from its known form of usage in the press or media.  In fact the word has been generalized for any type of error as it is these generation habit to, therefore I will use the word further in thus writing by its generalized sentiment after I explain from my perspective its intended place of usage.  

Typo’ which I initially explained, belong to the press or media means ‘error print’ ‘misprint’ and there after ‘error’ ‘mistake’. Now an error or mistake in my view is a ‘wrong result’ by someone/entity that had reasonable time and adequate resources in place to make necessary evaluations before giving a final result of anything but have slip-up, that is an error or a typo as they may call it, which is the lead to my first suggestions.

1.    For the benefit of writing I suggest if any given individual made a grammar or word spelling error that in my view does not qualify them for a typo, however, I would see it as a human error, which is an unforeseen human mistake and not as an imperfection by the person(s) that is if we are in a setting where it is required that we must be perfectionist. However if that individual give that writing to a next person or publishing entity for publishing and in the end that book still has that error, then it qualifies to be a typo. I hope you see where I am going? So yes there are considerations to make before we rule for typos.

2.    Consider the platform of communication, was it in the newspaper or just a blog comment. We cannot completely rule out someone for errors they made in a text while commenting on a blog or by text message from a mobile phone. This is what I like to call “speedwrite” and any given person can have errors and poor grammar etc… I mean we must understand that if someone is speedwriting they may as well not check the text over and over to see if they have it in the best English writing form or else they would also count the words and let you know as well.

3.    I am a victim of what I like to call “mixed words” -I am using this terms because you may find them useful as well. Now mixed words for me is when I know I meant to write ‘four,’ but my fingers receives the message as ‘for’ yet I am still reading it as four -and that may be the case in the opening paragraph of this article. Now I learned that I had that problem therefore I proof read all the time, but that doesn’t mean I will not make similar errors. I am human! Check suggestion point 4 on proof read.

4.    Many times people actually proof read what they have written themselves and I noticed it with myself, I would sit and read the article three times and don’t notic I did not write the ‘e’ in notice and  my wife would pick that up by the first time she reads. The point is, the writer reads what he knows and read it like he knows it, therefore the mind feed them only what they know and is not positioned to pick up the writing word by word to understand the message. I suggest if you have a major writing going official just have someone else proof reading for you to avoid typos.

5.    After all when you read material for the first time, read it in full by trying to understand the message, avoid reading with the mind on looking for ‘typos’. Some people do that just to try and get back at you, many times so if you beat them by a comment you made. I once wrote a comment on Yahoo news flashes long ago. Well I was writing as a ghostwriter then and although I wrote something meaningful on a subject about an issue of Refugees of Mali, one of the reader who was obviously a critic lashed out at me like; “Refuge huh? What about refuge, you obviously missed the point here dude…” and I noticed I had starter my sentence as; “The refuge crisis in Mali…” omitting the last ‘e’ of refugee. The guy simply jump the point because his attention caught the flaw in my writing and deviate from the message. Look for example in my opening sentence of this article, from which I asked the first question. Does the writer make sense? Yes the sentence makes sense. The person is doubtful about the job and that’s the point. Now on telling anyone about the typo they have made, first see if you can make out what the point is then consider my last suggestion below.

6.    Lastly, let us understand that being confronted with a typo is embarrassing, I know it because I lived it a few times. I am glad it happened because I can write to share my opinion on the subject now, but it is embarrassing. Some people will come and share it with you in private, I guess that’s fair, others will just say it out in the open, either way it is an embarrassment. If you really doubt that they know the correctness of the typo they made, I would suggest that you rather write the typo back to them in another context of replying and see if they noticed it from your end. If they don’t reply to show a sign that they have notice, write back to them and say you (not them) have made a typo and want to fix it and after they have seen that, let them know they also have made that typo and you are even (kind of in a jokey way). Is that a lot to ask? Yes I guess, but remember I said; not all of us are masters of English therefore let us be patient with one another.

Now in the closing, my article is not against people who have a correct view of English; on the contrary I think highly of them for their supreme efforts to get us to standard. I am also not trying to rule out that a typo is what it is, after all that’s the name given to that result. Neither do I say we have to go ahead and misuse the beautiful English, no! I am just saying let us look at the situation from the other point of view.


Well I guess that wraps up this one, but I just have one last question for you and it goes like this. What if you were trying to tell someone they have made a typo on social media platform with over 10million people commenting on the same issue and in the process of that, your response has a two typos as well? I am waiting to read your comments on that as well.

Have fun!


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