TR Forums

derFunkenstein · Thu Mar 03, 2016 11:55 am

kinda mangled that quote tag there - i didn't say that. :lol:

TwoEars · Thu Mar 03, 2016 12:24 pm

derFunkenstein wrote:
kinda mangled that quote tag there - i didn't say that.

Ooops, how did I manage that? Maybe I need a better editor? Haha. Fixed.

Welch · Thu Mar 03, 2016 3:27 pm

Glad to hear from you Jeff. I'm also very happy to hear that TR doesn't plan to succumb to the "sensationalized" articles that are the norm.

"AMD says their Zen CPU will be the fastest."

Actual headline after you click on the article

"AMD says their Zen CPU will be the fastest architecture they have ever designed. Still likely to be less powerful than Intel's offerings."

Not quite as bad as those auto generated ones like "Science finds 5 way to save on home loan, number 4 will surprise you!"

Wed Mar 16, 2016 1:38 pm

I'm going to throw my two dimes here. Keep in mind this is a personal view.

It's the people's fault. No, seriously, it is.

As Jeff pointed out, the cold, hard, harsh fact is that "10 best ways to" articles work precisely because people keep eating that stuff straight up. There's no two ways about it. And sure, someone can come back and say "you're just being an elitist jerk," to which I'll reply "that may well be true, but it changes nothing."

Businesses in general go where the money is, period, full stop. And the money is where people are, and people are reading listicles as is they were news. I've lost count of the times where I had to correct friends because they heard about a story that lacks any kind of context or is flat out wrong. It's gotten to the point where I don't even say anything if the misconception isn't that far away from the truth.

</rant version="1.0">

Ragnar Dan · Wed Mar 16, 2016 9:04 pm

I probably shouldn't add to this topic, since I generally agree with what's been said... though that won't quite stop me from adding my two bits.

When I read Flatland_Spider's post about idiot managers, I assumed it also included the content and lack of objectivity in modern journalism itself, which has been a subject of complaint for longer than I've lived. But perhaps I'm wrong in my assumption.

My understanding is that modern journalism was not an actual profession until certain events occurred, and the conversion into its being one filtered out many people who otherwise might have entered that business. Which is to say, high school graduates who liked to write and found news or other subjects interesting could become journalists. They had to learn the job and its rules from their bosses, who knew how to check sources, could reason logically, and had the outlet's reputation to protect. Editors demanded proof. That seems to be mostly gone, now.

And worse, writers and media types in general these days obviously have lost the knowledge their elders used to be taught in school. History? They have no clue. Science? "Well, this expert says so." Assumptions replace reason, and their audiences have noticed. I think that's what killed journalism, in the U.S. anyway.

DrCR · Wed Mar 16, 2016 10:01 pm

Welch wrote:
Is it sad that I couldn't get paste the first paragraph?

Sorry, I didn't past your 5th sentence.

For me, I find myself reading and watching non-American resources. For example, I'd much rather read bbc.co.uk, watch NHK, et al. than American sources. I've found the journalism tends to be far better, though the BBC doesn't seem to be what it used to be.

End User · Wed Mar 16, 2016 10:12 pm

Welch wrote:
Seriously.... regardless of where I read it seems like the idea of an editor is dead! I never thought I'd be THAT guy, but wow! Things misspelled, common phrases butchered because the author clearly doesn't know what they mean. It's like listening to Charlie from, It's Always Sunny!

http://www.droid-life.com/2016/03/01/ga ... l-apps-sd/

Why the **** are you upset? Their about page sums up who they are (and are not) in an extremely forthright manner.

Welch · Fri Mar 18, 2016 4:13 pm

[/quote]
Why the **** are you upset? Their about page sums up who they are (and are not) in an extremely forthright manner.[/quote]

It was a random example, I never claimed to know anything about their professionalism. The fact that you can pick out other acclaimed news sites and clearly see the lack of care for the articles is another thing (biased aside).

@Ragnar - Yep

@Morphine - For sure... It's no different than the idea of fast food vs cooking real meals. People have voted with their wallet, hence those companies expand out and continue to flourish. Yet you will have people who blame their problem on companies like McDonalds, "THEY MADE ME FAT!". Sometimes I fear that the movie Idiocracy is going to come true because the American people are willing to give in to stupidity because it's so damn easy to not think about topics critically.

End User · Sat Mar 19, 2016 4:19 pm

Welch wrote:
It was a random example

It was a very bad example.

Your post was poorly researched and therefore an excellent example of the exact thing you were ranting about.

Welch · Mon Mar 21, 2016 3:46 am

End User wrote:
Welch wrote:
It was a random example

It was a very bad example.

Your post was poorly researched and therefore an excellent example of the exact thing you were ranting about.

LOL ok... I made a forum post, far from a media outlet. So your example of my example being poor is that much more of a poor example.....

End User · Sat Mar 26, 2016 5:26 pm

Welch wrote:
End User wrote:
Welch wrote:
It was a random example

It was a very bad example.

Your post was poorly researched and therefore an excellent example of the exact thing you were ranting about.

LOL ok... I made a forum post, far from a media outlet. So your example of my example being poor is that much more of a poor example.....

Don't stoop to SSK's level. It does not become you.

Sat Apr 02, 2016 9:39 am

CNN wrote:
And as the political season slips closer toward November, Trump's prospects are coming into focus, as polls show he curtrails both potential Democratic rivals, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

Can't even use the "it made it past the spellchecker" excuse on that one... :roll:

Welch · Sun Apr 10, 2016 11:05 pm

just brew it! wrote:
CNN wrote:
And as the political season slips closer toward November, Trump's prospects are coming into focus, as polls show he curtrails both potential Democratic rivals, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

Can't even use the "it made it past the spellchecker" excuse on that one...

A fine example of what I'm talking about.

Mon Apr 11, 2016 9:14 pm

CNN wrote:
Kasich previewed a "hard-hitting" speech he plans to deliver Tuesday calling out his rivals, Cruz and Kasich, for stoking people's fears.

No proofreading. At all. That's the only possible explanation.

Maybe CNN ought to hire a 9-year-old as an editor. It would be a step up.

End User · Mon Apr 11, 2016 9:26 pm

Welch wrote:
just brew it! wrote:
CNN wrote:
And as the political season slips closer toward November, Trump's prospects are coming into focus, as polls show he curtrails both potential Democratic rivals, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

Can't even use the "it made it past the spellchecker" excuse on that one...

A fine example of what I'm talking about.

It's better than your first example.

Welch · Tue Apr 12, 2016 2:45 pm

End User wrote:
It's better than your first example.

Yes it is.

ludi · Tue Apr 26, 2016 1:16 pm

Hot off the press!

Redocbew · Tue Apr 26, 2016 1:33 pm

Hmm...

dictionary wrote:
lightening
noun, Medicine/Medical.

1. The descent of the uterus into the pelvic cavity, occurring toward the end of pregnancy, changing the contour of the abdomen and facilitating breathing by lessening pressure under the diaphragm.

That somehow seems an appropriate time for a fire.

Sun Oct 02, 2016 11:07 pm

Thread necro!

Front page story on cbsnews.com tonight: "More homes destroyed my Northern California wildfire"

Not a line in the body of the article... that's the frikkin' headline! :lol:

curtisb · Mon Oct 03, 2016 12:44 am

morphine wrote:
It's the people's fault. No, seriously, it is.

It's not just the article headlines that are peoples fault. It's also the grammar. You see it all the time when someone corrects someone else for using your when they meant you're. They either get called a grammar nazi, or get some reply about "oh you know what I meant!", or get the "It doesn't matter" reply.

I work in higher education. We created a Writing Center simply because we were getting scholarship submissions written in SMS shorthand. Seriously...

BIF · Mon Oct 03, 2016 1:11 am

My pet peeves, but I hear some of these in spoken language as well as the written word, so I wonder if the whole language is just going through a complete "slangolution". Many of these appear in written (sans editor) articles, but they also show up the world over in blog posts, article replies, and forum posts. A lot of people don't speak English as a first language, so I try to be understanding.

But since we're griping (not "gripping"):

your/you're
were/we're
they/they're/their/there
then/than
hear/here
"alot"
"case and point"
"it's a mute point"
"one of" instead of "one off" (as in, it's "a one off occurrence"). But "one of" might even be correct.
"type thing" (as in, "it's that type of thing")
"why don't you" and "why don't we" are much too frequent for my taste.
any leet or "slanguage" misspelling, such as h8r, Xmas, or "murica" (even in mock, even in jest). I'm fine with these in text messages, but not in written prose.
any use of apostrophe for possessive when it should only be used in contraction (its/it's).

I am guilty of some of the above, but I know better. And that last one is most annoying when I catch myself doing it.

Oh, and then there's the "wall of text without a return key". Yep, even in written articles. I just skip those.

The Egg · Mon Oct 03, 2016 8:06 am

Some of my idiot highschool friends also conflate "are" with "our", or write out "could of/would of/should of", when they mean the contraction "should've". It's not even worth trying to correct.

derFunkenstein · Mon Oct 03, 2016 8:21 am

The Egg wrote:
Some of my idiot high school friends also conflate "are" with "our", or write out "could of/would of/should of", when they mean the contraction "should've". It's not even worth trying to correct.

That last part is so true. There are so many that you can't just spend all your time correcting those mistakes for free. Unfortunately, since so many poorly-written articles get published, some of this stuff is going to wind up becoming official.

curtisb · Mon Oct 03, 2016 5:00 pm

BIF wrote:
]any leet or "slanguage" misspelling, such as h8r, Xmas, or "murica" (even in mock, even in jest).

What's sad is they're now starting to add a lot of the slang to the Oxford Dictionary. 'Merica was added this year.

http://public.oed.com/the-oed-today/rec ... mber-2016/

Warning...some of the words on the list could be considered NSFW.

ludi · Sun Oct 09, 2016 9:47 pm

NBC Denver, the gift that keeps on giving:

Mon Oct 10, 2016 12:16 pm

CBS News wrote:
Officials across the state of Vermont have expressed sorry at the teens allegedly killed by Bourgoin.

Mon Oct 10, 2016 2:44 pm

just brew it! wrote:
CBS News wrote:
Officials across the state of Vermont have expressed sorry at the teens allegedly killed by Bourgoin.

Truly horrific day yesterday. A branch of the wife's family lives in the Mad River Valley and knew these kids. The entire community is a wreck. The driver is now facing 5 murder charges and $1MM bail.

Mon Oct 10, 2016 2:56 pm

Captain Ned wrote:
just brew it! wrote:
CBS News wrote:
Officials across the state of Vermont have expressed sorry at the teens allegedly killed by Bourgoin.

Truly horrific day yesterday. A branch of the wife's family lives in the Mad River Valley and knew these kids. The entire community is a wreck. The driver is now facing 5 murder charges and $1MM bail.

Wow. My condolences to your wife's family.

Tue Dec 20, 2016 8:14 am

I have been noticing an increasing tendency to use "break" instead of "brake", both in online discussions and news articles.

Latest example: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/nhtsa-evalu ... -selector/

CNN wrote:
Most of the complaints allege the incidents happen when the vehicle was running, some when the vehicle was off, no reports indicate the parking break was engaged at the time of the rollaway.

Edit: That article is a twofer. Subbed "devises" for "devices" too.

CNN wrote:
The devises have become favored by automakers as they take up less space in the console of the car, leaving room for other features like larger cup holders or device chargers.

oomjcv · Tue Dec 20, 2016 10:13 am

I see the same thing at my work. We don't publish anything, but our clients must read our documents so you'd think they are flawless. Even though all (well, most) documents are reviewed by another employee prior to approval, some of the grammar and spelling I've seen leave our office have been quite poor. No one seems to mind though, I've seen some work from other companies in the same line of work which were just as poor.

The increasing use of English by non-English people is a key contributor I think; they don't really notice incorrect spelling or improper arrangement of words. Granted, many English-speaking people aren't much better. It is mostly good enough as long as the reader can make out the idea. I suppose for most people that's OK, language is only a means of communication after all, not some flawlewss science. Makes me wonder how language will develop in the coming decades, perhaps we have made it too much of an 'art'?

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