I’ve read this thread twice over, and I can say with deadset certainty that spelling mistakes don’t bother me that much if it is an obvious typo. (goodness knows I’ve made more than my share of those) If the person doesn’t know how to spell the word, I can understand where looking it up in the dictionary might be hard. But if someone makes the same mistake on a consistent basis, then it starts to bother me. (like “eatting” for “eating”, “aweful” for “awful”, “writting” for “writing”, etc. … GAH!)
I try to keep good spelling and grammar to the best of my ability on here, ICQ, or whatever computer application I am using , but there are times when I don’t know how to spell a word. In such a case, I’d either go to my dictionary or use a different word altogether. It’s not that hard to remember to capitalize things and remember the basic rules of spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc. I’m sure that I’ve tripped up many times in the past and will in the future, but seriously!
As for “chat abbreviations” such as “u”, “ppl”, and the others I’ve come across, I don’t use them much, if at all. My brain just supplies me with the correct spelling of the word I’m using, and my fingers just type it out.
What do I think of people who use chat abbreviations? Well, to save time occasionally, it’s all right, but if you use them on a very consistent basis, that will get to bothering me pretty quick. You wouldn’t use those in a business presentation, would you? I hope not! (I used to know someone on ICQ who used those abbreviations a lot; nothing too intrinsically wrong with that, but his spelling was also horrendous!)
Generally (whether that be on ICQ, message boards, email, notes to friends, etc.), I use all the rules of spelling, grammar, etc. as I was taught. It’s stood me in good stead so far. This is not to say that I am against using abbreviations and such to save time now and again, but most of the time, I’d say you have chances to preview, proofread, edit (not applicable to this message board, but to some others that I frequent), correct things as many times as needed, and NOT use abbreviations unless absolutely necessary! It doesn’t take THAT much more time and energy to type “anyone” than it does to type “ne1”, does it?
So typing out everything you want to say instead of using shorthand might take a few extra seconds or so: believe me, it’s appreciated! If you have some kind of medical condition that prevents you from doing so in the interests of economy and all that, then say so at the outset! We’ll understand, really!
(I’m checking carefully to see if there are any violations of Gaudere’s law first before I submit this)
