Front-Page Quality Control

skoker · Sep 27, 2006

First off, I'd just like to say that this is *not a rant*, just a "helpful observation".

I've noticed over the past week or so that every article that comes out on the MR front page seems to have a few "tipoes" in it. For example:

smart refrehes

...and then there is some inconsistencies with the spelling of some words:

webmail

web mail

.

Those are just two of the things that I found really quick, and I know there are more out there. I know they are only small things, but when they are often the first thing people see when they come to MacRumors they are important.

Blue Velvet · Sep 27, 2006

I've also noticed this as well, also in opening posts on News and Article discussion threads. Doesn't look good and it wouldn't hurt to run things through a spell-check or a second subbing now and then.

I realise resources are scarce though so all praise for those involved. Personally, I feel the standard and frequency of interesting stories and links has improved over the past few months, so all hats off to the editors.

Grimace · Sep 27, 2006

I would also like to second one major grammatical point that I see all over the place (and it drives me nuts

) Examples:

"I heard Apple are going to come out with something new"
"Apple have pulled the image off of the server"

Apple is one (singular) company!

"Apple is going come out with something new".
"Apple has pulled the image off of the server"

Ugh, rant over.

p0intblank · Sep 27, 2006

carletonmusic said:
I would also like to second one major grammatical point that I see all over the place (and it drives me nuts ) Examples:

"I heard Apple are going to come out with something new"
"Apple have pulled the image off of the server"

Apple is one (singular) company!

"Apple is going come out with something new".
"Apple has pulled the image off of the server"

Ugh, rant over.

Actually I think that can go both ways... but I'm not totally sure. I prefer to use the singular term, like Apple is a computer company.

iMeowbot · Sep 27, 2006

carletonmusic said:
Apple is one (singular) company!

Sometimes. http://alt-usage-english.org/groupnames.html

In particular, "Apple is preparing for the introduction of their new model" is bad grammar. The same sentence with "Apple are preparing" (or "its new model") would be better.

skoker · Sep 27, 2006

To add to the subject, I got this email from equinox, usa this morning:

iTunes' Cover Flow and CoverScout's flexible search - a great team!

With iTunes' integrated Cover Flow you can flip through your digital music collection the same way you can flip through your CD shelf. So be sure to use CoverScout in order to have ALL your albums covered. With the new iTunes feature, a complete library is more important than ever before.

Experience a fully covered iTunes library and download a free trail version of CoverScout today.

This update is free for all CoverScout 2.x users. Purchases can be made directly in our online store.

Worst part is that word was linked in blue so it really stood out. Probably 100,000 people got that email

Chundles · Sep 27, 2006

carletonmusic said:
I would also like to second one major grammatical point that I see all over the place (and it drives me nuts ) Examples:

"I heard Apple are going to come out with something new"
"Apple have pulled the image off of the server"

Apple is one (singular) company!

"Apple is going come out with something new".
"Apple has pulled the image off of the server"

Ugh, rant over.

Both are actually acceptable, the "Apple is" being more prevalent in the US where the company is seen as a singular and the "Apple are" being more prevalent in Commonwealth nations where Apple is seen as a company made of a collective of people.

As an Aussie, I tend to use the latter.

andiwm2003 · Sep 27, 2006

carletonmusic said:
I would also like to second one major grammatical point that I see all over the place (and it drives me nuts ) Examples:

"I heard Apple are going to come out with something new"
"Apple have pulled the image off of the server"

Apple is one (singular) company!

"Apple is going come out with something new".
"Apple has pulled the image off of the server"

Ugh, rant over.

outside the US using the plural seems to be o.k.. in the US the singular is o.k.. what ticks me off is that some people from US seem to think that on an international website only the US version is acceptable. give us a break. [/rant]

bousozoku · Sep 27, 2006

carletonmusic said:
I would also like to second one major grammatical point that I see all over the place (and it drives me nuts ) Examples:

"I heard Apple are going to come out with something new"
"Apple have pulled the image off of the server"

Apple is one (singular) company!

"Apple is going come out with something new".
"Apple has pulled the image off of the server"

Ugh, rant over.

It's a shame you don't know proper English, sticking with that American stuff.

Everywhere but the U.S.A., it's proper to refer to a company as the group of people it is.

spicyapple · Sep 27, 2006

As a bona-fide Canadian, the plural form to denote a company (Apple are cool) is awkward.

Eric5h5 · Sep 27, 2006

carletonmusic said:
(and it drives me nuts )

Get used to it.

When I first encountered the plural form of referring to companies (in an imported UK computer mag), I thought it was weird and awkward. But now I actually prefer it and think it makes more sense (companies aren't singular entities; they are made up of people), and usually write it that way. (But that superfluous "u" in words like color and honor is just silly, sorry.

)

And yeah...spellcheck please. Obviously it won't catch everything, but we're using OS X here (or at least I hope we are) which makes it stupidly quick and easy.

--Eric

Doctor Q · Sep 27, 2006

Our stories are written and posted as promptly as we can. We try not to spend much time in the "editing" phase, and often apply small changes after the fact. Sure, we could do better, but we're dealing with humans (at least until I finish my A.I. robot-editor program - heh heh).

When more than one of our MacRumors editors are around, we sometimes pass stories around before posting them, but most often we have to go with an early draft first to keep up with Apple's fast-paced world, and then do touch-up work afterwards. We judge the tradeoff for each story.

For MacRumorsLive coverage of special events, we apply minimal editing, although we did fix a number of typos recently, in realtime, in information we were receiving during those events.

You can help us best by (1) using the Report Bad Post

system to let us know of errors you spot and (2) not making posts in the thread about the same corrections, because that makes more cleanup work for the moderators after we apply the story corrections.

As far as the to-may-to/to-mah-to issues go (phrasing that each person might use differently), we leave those choices up to each individual editor.

skoker · Sep 27, 2006

Doctor Q said:
Our stories are written and posted as promptly as we can. We try not to spend much time in the "editing" phase, and often apply small changes after the fact. Sure, we could do better, but we're dealing with humans (at least until I finish my A.I. robot-editor program - heh heh).

When more than one of our MacRumors editors are around, we sometimes pass stories around before posting them, but most often we have to go with an early draft first to keep up with Apple's fast-paced world, and then do touch-up work afterwards. We judge the tradeoff for each story.

For MacRumorsLive coverage of special events, we apply minimal editing, although we did fix a number of typos recently, in realtime, in information we were receiving during those events.

You can help us best by (1) using the Report Bad Post

system to let us know of errors you spot and (2) not making posts in the thread about the same corrections, because that makes more cleanup work for the moderators after we apply the story corrections.

As far as the to-may-to/to-mah-to issues go (phrasing that each person might use differently), we leave those choices up to each individual editor.

One quick point: Is it not safe to assume that most submissions are posted from Mac OS X-based computers? Doesn't auto-spell check pick those 'embarrassing typos' up in your browser?

(If you're posting from PC's at work, I salute you. Stick it to the man!)

MacNut · Sep 27, 2006

Is it really that big a deal. I would rather fast info then being delayed 5 minutes for proofreading. This isn't the New York Times.

skoker · Sep 28, 2006

MacNut said:
... would rather fast info ...

Case.In.Point.

longofest · Oct 4, 2006

Hey guys-

Just saw the thread. I personally appologize for my hand in some of the typos that occured last week. I know I submitted one story that people claimed had 4 (although only 2 words) alone, which is deinititely over the top either way.

As Q said, we do try to balance expediency and quality. When we take too long to edit an article, we end up getting complaints about "this is old news." When we do it too quickly, we end up having mistakes. As I said, it's a balance...

As for last week in particular, my stories personally were a bit handicapped by my situation. I prefer to post stories within Safari, because it has built-in spellchecking. What do I have to work with at work recently? IE and Windows 2K. Crapola. Plus, I can't AIM the stories to one of my fellow editors to bounce it off them (ports blocked). That being said, I'm taking more time to edit now if I feel called to take the time and post at work.

BTW... originial poster (skoker). Thanks for the class you showed in bringing up the issue. We get a lot of flack around here that isn't quite as constructive and have to just brush off (it still adds up though), and appreciate it when you approach the situation like you did.

EDIT: no wisecracks about any misspellingz

in this post.

skoker · Oct 4, 2006

longofest said:
deinititely

Heh.Heh.Heh.

Anyways, maybe Arn could install some type of Java-web-based spell check for you guys? I know that there is a few out there, and there are vB plugins too if that's how you submit your stories.

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