When I see words that are jammed together without proper spacing - as you might see in URLs, for instance - I will frequently insert the spacing in the wrong places. For instance, there’s a website urging people to get outside and enjoy using recreational vehicles. When I see the URL, I think “gorving? WTF is gorving?” (Go RV-ing (dot)com). Same for the US Army’s recruiting website: Goar my and not Go Army. I even do this with online nicks. I will frequently read @puzzlegal as “puzz legal”. Anybody else have this problem?
I don’t think it’s a problem with your brain, it’s a pretty common thing with words that have been smooshed together, as in a URL.
A couple funny examples from the early days of the internet-- a website called Experts Exchange realized far too late that they should have added a hyphen to ‘expertsexchange [dot] com’. And an Italian company called Powergen Italia realized the same thing, too late-- ‘powergenitalia [dot] com’.
I have a farm website, and I keep getting offers to buy a domain address – with the divider in the farm name in the wrong place entirely, changing the meaning drastically.
I think this sort of thing is pretty common. I also do it sometimes.
For the longest time I thought it was Man Get Out instead of @Mangetout, French for eats all. And I also thought that it was Puzz Legal for the longest time.
Then again, my brain doesn’t always function properly either.
Good point, solo street!
As I’ve mentioned before on this Board, I once saw a sign that read…
MYTH READING SALON
… and I thought “Why haven’t I heard about this before? I love reading myths!”
Then I looked closer at the sign, and saw that it really read
MY THREADING SALON
I still read “Puzzlegal” as “puzz legal”; too many years at the Bar not to see the word “legal” there.
(and I did initially wonder if puzz was ever illegal somewhere and that had changed.)
Not far from me is an attorney’s office with their website address on the bottom of a signboard. It says, “[town name]lawhelp(dot)com.” Of course, I read it as “[town name] La Whelp (dot) com.
There is a news outlet here called Big Island News Now. I always read their website as Big Island New Snow.
We’re taught to read(in English)a certain way. When what you see on a page or screen is interpreted way back in your brain to when you first read sentences. If it doesn’t fit the norm your brain tries to fix it to fit something you can understand.
Blame your early reading comprehension.
I read early, but it was years before sentence structure even occurred to me. By then it was ingrained. Add dialect and any foreign words or phrases and I got a lot of things confused.
It’s not your brain. It’s everyone’s brain.
I’ve seen a bunch of signs and businesses that if they’d have shown it to one 14yo boy, first, the embarrassing name would be apparent.
Everyone who has ever registered a domain name containing the word “therapist” has eventually regretted it.
I learned that one from Benny Hill!
#nods# A venue that featured house and hip hop registered as hiphophut.com and of course I stared at it and sounded it out as “high foe futt”.
You definitely ain’t alone.
I will never not read it as puzz legal.
It’s also a famous Saturday Night Live skit.
There’s a town in England named Scunthorpe that became famous as one of the first places blocked in URLs because of a hidden combination of characters. The town has given its name to the phenomena, called the Scunthorpe Problem.
Let’s not forget Pen Island.
I’ve done that with user names here, too, but not the ones mentioned. Unfortunately my brain isn’t braining enough right now to remember which.
Didn’t know that. If it wasn’t the original cast, I didn’t see it.
I’m glad to see I’m far from the onliest one. I’ll stop wondering if I’m some kind of dyslexic weirdo.
I think the correct pronunciation would be “high fuh futt".
NASA also got hit with the Scunthorpe Problem, on a page about the Mars Explorer mission.
A Chinese restaurant in Philly called “Han Dynasty” quickly became known by locals as “Handy Nasty.”