Thursday, October 9, 2008

One Space or Two?


After reading a thought provoking and informative post by my clever and intelligent cousin (in-law) Cheri about grammatical errors and pet peeves with word/phrase usage, I have been informed that my lifelong habit of typing TWO spaces at the end of a sentence is no longer "industry standard." This article told me how continuing to use two spaces will provide rivers of white space that are distracting and dangerous to the overall look and feel of documents and web information. I feel like my world has been turned upside down.

**Did you know the new rule?
**What pet peeves do you have (e.g. the incorrect usage of "your" and "you're") when it comes to grammar and punctuation?

10 comments:

Victoria said...

No picky grammatical errors for me, my grammar is probably sub-par anyways. I HATE misappropriation of quotation marks. Seems to happen more often in small town stores. You know they type up stuff like "Thank You"
Really? Do you appreciate my business or is it a joke?

Here is a funny blog that I peruse on occasion when I need a laugh http://quotation-marks.blogspot.com/

Cheri said...

I HATE this new rule! Well, I haven't heard it in "rule" terms necessarily, but I do know that it's recommended. As an editor, I choose to ignore it when it's done either way - I no longer "fix" papers that have just one space but I do like the two spaces because it makes a clean break. And the you're/your thing bugs me bigtime too. There are so many others I could have listed... but didn't want to come off as a know-it-all. :)

RyanH said...

This here won buhgs mee 2. Eye cant stand trieing to onlee puht won spahce aftur a dot.

Yes, I was taught in typing class to always do two spaces after a period, and it is just habit. This one is going to take a while to break!

Anonymous said...

I didn't realize how dangerously I have been living!

This is probably linked somehow to the green movement... conservation of space and all.

Heidi said...

Whoa. I don't think I can abide by that rule....

the harpers said...

The debate continues in our house over using the word 'hang' in the right tense. I will say "hanged" and Scott will correct me and say "hung". (I really know it is "hanged"...:))
Oh, and another one...how do you make a smile face in ()?? Do you have two bottom lips? Or should you make a space, or two spaces?!?

Jill said...

Thanks Lisa! I had never heard that rule before. I feel totally feel outdated.

I had to erase my extra space after every sentence in this comment. How annoying!

Sally said...

I'm so opposed. I will not change. I hate errant apostrophes. They're absolutely everywhere, and no one even knows what they do anymore. They think any word that ends in "s" needs one. Also, when people say "I could care less" instead of "I couldn't care less". In one case you could, the other you couldn't, but people usually use the first one.

Unknown said...

I think that I am going to throw that new crap in the same pile with the scientist who say that Pluto isn't a planet anymore.

Kristi said...

I don't think I will be able to unprogram my programed thumb from hitting the space bar two times. Yikes!! My pet peeve is misspelled words. I'm not perfect, but I just cringe when I see that. (Now watch, there will be a misspelling in my comment! Hehe.)