Anand needs a copy editor!

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Felger Carbon
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Anand needs a copy editor!

Post by Felger Carbon » Thu Oct 25, 2007 5:49 pm

Some folks expand their vocabulary (at a yound age) by reading; some by conversation. In the latter case, it can cause hilarity when conversational language is translated into print.

Copy editing itself can be a problem. The words "flack" and "flak" are both correctly spelled and have incredibly different meanings. And yet, as a magazine article author, I have had my use of each of those two words "corrected" by a not-so-well-read copy editor.

Still, Anand's site really needs a copy editor. For one thing, to prevent the phrase "waiting with bated breath" from being written as "waiting with baited breath"! Anchovy breath, anyone? This is actually becoming a common mistake; nobody who learned by conversation knows the word "bated" and what it means.

But writing "on the heals of" instead of the correct "on the heels of" (meaning closely followed) is darn near inexcusable. On this page the heal/heel error is in the first paragraph and old 'anchovy breath' is in the last.

FYI: "flack": think Hollywood publicist. "Flak": think the Gregory Peck movie "Ten O'Clock High" and the explosive air bursts from German anti-aircraft guns.

nightmorph
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Re: Anand needs a copy editor!

Post by nightmorph » Thu Oct 25, 2007 5:57 pm

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Felger Carbon
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Re: Anand needs a copy editor!

Post by Felger Carbon » Thu Oct 25, 2007 6:34 pm

nightmorph wrote:
Felger Carbon wrote:Some folks expand their vocabulary (at a yound age)
young age

What's my prize?
You get penalized for not spotting the wrong title for the Peck movie. :D No prize for you! (It's "Twelve O'clock High".)

VanWaGuy
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Post by VanWaGuy » Thu Oct 25, 2007 7:47 pm

Hey Felger,

I may have only gone to college a few miles West of you, but mistakes like that would have gotten us automatic "F"'s in writing class. My least favorite class, but things like that were a peeve of the writing department chairperson.

JoeWPgh
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Post by JoeWPgh » Thu Oct 25, 2007 10:37 pm

This touches on something I was wondering about the other day. If someone does something monumentally stupid, is it hare brained or hair brained?

HueyCobra
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Re: Anand needs a copy editor!

Post by HueyCobra » Fri Oct 26, 2007 12:37 am

Felger Carbon wrote:Still, Anand's site really needs a copy editor.
Have you seen DailyTech? Priorities. :)

psiu
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Post by psiu » Fri Oct 26, 2007 2:06 am

JoeWPgh wrote:This touches on something I was wondering about the other day. If someone does something monumentally stupid, is it hare brained or hair brained?
Go with harebrained. Hairbrained started off as alternate spelling (as hair was an alternate spelling for hare) but nowadays, my guess would be that people are dum.

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-hai1.htm

nightmorph
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Post by nightmorph » Fri Oct 26, 2007 5:30 pm

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psiu
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Post by psiu » Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:08 pm

nightmorph wrote:
psiu wrote:my guess would be that people are dum.
s/dum/dumb
*sigh*

Tap on your sarcasm meter, I think the needle on the gauge is sticking. ;)

DanceMan
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Post by DanceMan » Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:29 pm

For one thing, to prevent the phrase "waiting with bated breath" from being written as "waiting with baited breath"!
Pour les Canadiens suelement:

Popular comedic parody of former Prime Minister Jean Chretien: "I yam waiting wit bait on my breath." He was often said to be malaprop in both official languages.

One of my pet peeves is the use of "loose" for lose.

nightmorph
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Post by nightmorph » Fri Oct 26, 2007 8:26 pm

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jaganath
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Post by jaganath » Sat Oct 27, 2007 1:57 am

One of my pet peeves is the use of "loose" for lose.
holy mackerel, then don't come to the UK, it's probably the most common spelling mistake after "should of" instead of "should have". drives me crazy too.

Matija
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Post by Matija » Sat Oct 27, 2007 3:51 am

Whenever someone writes "could/should/would of", I die a little.

Then again, a UK person once greeted me online with "high".

floffe
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Post by floffe » Sat Oct 27, 2007 9:05 am

Tow/toe the line, can a native speaker enlighten me? Toe the line is pretty obvious (stepping right on it with your toes), but is there really a way to tow it? I see this quite often, and most of the time just assume it's a mistake.

NeilBlanchard
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Post by NeilBlanchard » Sat Oct 27, 2007 10:24 pm

Greetings,

I believe it is "toe the line" as in line up to have an even start of the race?

I can't tell you how many times I have seen there/their/they're swapped about!

tempeteduson
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Post by tempeteduson » Sat Oct 27, 2007 11:37 pm

Yes, Anandtech is in need of a copy editor, but I think they're in more need of <gasp> good writers. Except for Anand himself (and perhaps a couple others), the reviewers there write way too many words. Get to the point already, and fluffy adjectives (and adverbs) make a good article not. They say things like "fully compatible", "fully expect", and "fully believe" more times than I can count. Please tell me when something is not fully compatible, or that you don't fully expect or believe something.

Just wanted to get that off my chest.

HueyCobra
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Post by HueyCobra » Sun Oct 28, 2007 1:01 am

Again, even worse at AnandTech's sister/cousin site DailyTech, which actually has a mandate for direct, punchy articles :)

floffe
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Post by floffe » Sun Oct 28, 2007 1:22 am

I checked Longmans, and there was no mention of any line under tow, only toe. I guess that settles it.

HueyCobra
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Post by HueyCobra » Mon Oct 29, 2007 4:20 am

Legit Reviews deserves an honourable mention:
The Intel Core 2 Extreme Processor QX9650 is proudly taking over where Conroe and Kentsfield left off - driving the steak a little deeper into the heart of AMD.
Yet another way red meat can kill you :P

HueyCobra
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Location: Australia

Re: Anand needs a copy editor!

Post by HueyCobra » Tue Oct 30, 2007 3:18 am

Felger Carbon wrote:For one thing, to prevent the phrase "waiting with bated breath" from being written as "waiting with baited breath"!
Classic "baited"/"bated" quip at DailyTech :lol:

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