One thing that I never will understand is how people with a high-profile website will still post news (or whatever it is they post) that has some glaring spelling or punctuation error. I suppose it happens because they don’t know that they are doing it, and that someone should step up and show them, but some (and by ‘some’ I mean ‘a great deal’) people not only acknowledge that they don’t have a firm grasp of the rules of the written English language, but they aren’t inclined to do anything about it. That is an unacceptable position to have, especially on any site that tries to pass itself off as any sort of serious site.
I know that a lot of people have trouble with their spelling and grammar, but there are free tools out there to help them out.
Now I don’t want this to sound like I am condemning bad spelling/grammar on all fronts. Errors in IRC and other forms of instant messaging are acceptable because of their nature. There is little time for proofreading if you want to be a productive member of the conversation. Pages on the Web are another matter, there is ample time from conception to publication for proofreading of works, as well as the ability to correct them after a mistake is discovered, so there really is no excuse for the transgressions to keep happening.
Except for laziness, and that’s rarely a viable excuse for anything.
I guess I can get off my soap box now.