Fanfic peeves redux

[Foxboy]

Okay, "defiantly" for "definitely" has officially irked me. It's a spell-check error: of that, I am certain.
Much like "to," "two," and "too." These words, while correctly spelled, are probably not the words that the author intended.
I presume that the given example was entered, pre-spell-check, as "definately..."
grr.
Grr, I say.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

[Bob Schroeck]

Hm, actually, that makes sense. Careless spellchecking would indeed explain the distressing uniformity of that particular error...

-- Bob
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For Jor-El so loved the Earth, he sent his only begotten son...

[Wolff]

"quite" and "quiet" has been pissing me off lately. The sad thing is, so many of these type of errors are relatively easy to spot if you *actually go back and read what you wrote*. I know, I know, that's a pretty radical expectation, but still.
The other thing that's been really irritating me is people who substitute "thru" for "through". If you're truly that lazy, why are you bothering to write? Crap like this can completely break a story for me. I'm happily reading along, and boom! I'm thrown straight out of suspension of disbelief. Now, I consider myself to be rather well-read, and fairly erudite, and I get picky about crap like this. Am I the only one, or is my reaction to this stuff more typical than atypical?
-W"Ah, great. More androids." "We're not androids, we're the Knight Sabers!" "Huh. Frederick's of Hollywood has a line of power armor out. Who knew?"Falling out of aeroplanes and hiding out in holes

Waiting for the sunset to come, people going home

Jump out from behind them and shoot them in the head

Now everybody dancing the dance of the dead

[HoagieOfDoom]

This kind of stuff usually gets me too. Usually I give the author the benefit of a doubt the first time I see one since it's possibly a one-time error, but if it shows up regularlity, then I simply stop reading.*********
Touched By His Noodly Appendage
www.venganza.org

[Jeanne Hedge]

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"quite" and "quiet" has been pissing me off lately. The sad thing is, so many of these type of errors are relatively easy to spot if you *actually go back and read what you wrote*. I know, I know, that's a pretty radical expectation, but still.

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Actually, it's not that relatively easy to spot at all. It's been proven that your brain will play tricks on you with written material, especially when its something you're quite familiar with. It's not unusual for you to see and read what should be there instead of what really is there.
Have you seen that "test" where you're given written text with many letters missing, yet you can still read it with little difficulty? That's what's happening there - the brain is presenting what should be as opposed to what is.Jeanne
"Believe me, if I have to go the rest of my life without companionship, knowing myself won't be a problem."
-- Gabrielle of Potadeia

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www.jhedge.com

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Jeanne Hedge
www.jhedge.com

"Believe me, if I have to go the rest of my life without companionship, knowing myself won't be a problem."
-- Gabrielle of Potadeia

[Disruptor]

I have read several books where a few sentences are missing words such as the, of, and a few other common words. Only after the third re-read have I spotted the missing words.
--------------------
Tom Mathews aka Disruptor

[Black Aeronaut]

---

Actually, it's not that relatively easy to spot at all. It's been proven that your brain will play tricks on you with written material, especially when its something you're quite familiar with. It's not unusual for you to see and read what should be there instead of what really is there.

---

NARGH! That happens to me so much that it pisses me off. This is why actually having prereaders is so important to people like me. Bob'll probably find several errors despite my efforts when he finally gets around to reading Guardian Angel.

---

Have you seen that "test" where you're given written text with many letters missing, yet you can still read it with little difficulty? That's what's happening there - the brain is presenting what should be as opposed to what is.

---

Never seen that before. You got a link for it?-NeoRaven
"I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity." -Edgar Allen Poe
Sponsored by Black Aeronaut Technologies -
Aerospace solutions for the discerning spacer.-NeoRaven

"I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity." -Edgar Allen Poe

Sponsored by Black Aeronaut Technologies -

Aerospace solutions for the discerning spacer.

[Foxboy]

Paris in the
the spring.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

[Happerry]

I did not note the second the until the second time I read it

[jpub]

Actually, that one brings up my other peeve(s):
1) Illuminatus-itis: The tendency to scene break without any clue to the reader, so the poor reader can be 6-10 lines into a new scene without noticing it. Named for the work which foisted this style on us first.
2) Linebreak-ism: The tendency to inflict new lines at seemingly random moments.
3) The burly detective syndrome gone wrong: Mostly seen in BtVS fiction. Instead of just leaving it at 'the red-headed witch', writers go further and use silly descriptors like 'the former present of the We-Hate-Cordelia Club'.--
Christopher Angel, aka JPublic
The Works of Christopher Angel

[katreus]

The former present...? o.O
Heh.
My pet peeve is actually lack of formatting. Some mess up concerning words is okay provided it's not everywhere. But a fanfic that's stuck all together in one huge paragraph or one that's double spaced but goes all the way across the screen -- and then some more -- makes me give up on the fic right away.

[Bob Schroeck]

"The former president", no doubt.
And yeah, boneheaded formatting (or none at all) will make me trash a fic without even reading it.
It's supposed to be fun, not work, after all.

-- Bob
---------
For Jor-El so loved the Earth, he sent his only begotten son...

[HoagieOfDoom]

In some cases, the Reform program that was posted to the FFML a little while ago can fix bad formatting. Lemmesee...ah!, here we go!. As long as you can navigate in DOS, it's pretty simple to use.*********
Touched By His Noodly Appendage
www.venganza.org

[Bob Schroeck]

Random Buffyfic. All the usual spelling and syntax errors, but they're mostly invisible to me these days if I want them to be.
And then...
Two references to Faith's "payroll officer".
It actually took me a moment's thought and a teaspoon of later context to realize the author actually meant "parole officer."
Yeesh.


-- Bob
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For Jor-El so loved the Earth, he sent his only begotten son...