Why do people put spaces before punctuation and capitalize random words in sentences?

One common mistake that gets my blood boiling is a double space after a period or comma. It is a mistake and those who do it should be shunned.

i do it for a few reasons

1) to make the post easier to read.

2) certian spelling mistakes.....in certain posts.....is to save the world when using google....from being reffered here.

3) to articuate certain expression which cannot be expressed using the common standard in the medium of text


i can go on...

but this bores me..lol

peace

Originally posted by Nanocyte

Originally posted by misscurious
The answer to your question is smart phones.. that is why you are seeing these errors..

And I'm not sure if smart phones are a sufficient explanation. I'm sure that a lot of the shorthand, spelling, and grammatical errors that have crept into English are largely a result of smart phone usage, but these particular errors seem like they have another origin.

Nano, misscurious is suggesting people are actually using smartphones and tablets to post in forums and social networks not necessarily carrying over their posting habits. Autocorrect is not exactly perfect and I've had many a text message get wonky as a result. Unfortunately too many people depend heavily on it.

reply to post by Nanocyte


Well as others have said a lot of it is for convenience (same reason gov uses acronyms for everything) others are cultural/social, but for me I have a tendency (on forums at least) to write or type like I talk in real life. I use spaces and often use "..." after words.

If you look at many of my previous posts they are no where near correct in grammar but I try to spell correctly and structure my sentences for easy reading.

One if interested enough could view/research people's typing tendencies as a digital finger print of their person. Just as hand-writing analysts do today. Everyone has certain tendencies that make their presentation unique (which i think is a good thing).

You can tell when someone is typing on caffeine or on empty...the amount of effort they put into a post/reply/thread is indicative of their energy levels...

obviously I just had a cup of coffee

Wut , this is WRONG? I guess IVE been doin it wrong dis whole time .

Anyone else notice that run on sentence in the first paragraph of the OP?
Just thought I'd mention it.

why, because some people are using apple products and it randomly capitalizes letters that shouldn't be capitalized and changes words to completely other words than the ones you were trying to punch.

if you're punching in to fast and more focused on your thought than what is on screen, you'll end up with something that looks like a complete imbecile with no grasp of the english language and with no access to education wrote.

i guess you can turn the feature off. but usually you're spending 3x as long fixing all the grammar, random capital letters, and misspelled words in what you wrote.

sometimes, it's just not worth the trouble to fix them.

reply to post by Nanocyte


You didn't indent...
smh

i can say this much.. about the seemingly random capitalization of words it's not random it's utilized to put an emphasis on the word that's capitalized.. for example..

"i'd like to know if You are wearing spongebob square pants underwear?"

kinda like an inflection on the word. most people do not type properly so it's something that has developed and evolved over the years in the world of cyberspace the same as all the quirky computer acronyms that has evolved from IT abbreviations.

My iPad sometimes leaves a full stop or capital letter when I write here and usually I can't be bothered to sort it.
But what gets me is a post that has no commas or full stops or capitals and is hard to read as its all just one huge mess. It's just like one huge sentence .

I do it because the stupid phone I type with has a bugged out keyboard.

A woman in her late 30's at my office didn't realize that it was "until" and not "till".

She'd write something like, "I don't get off work till 4:00pm." or "Suzzie is not due for a promotion till she completes her probationary period."

She's a supervisor, and has a 4 year BA. She was going to be a teacher...

reply to post by Nanocyte


Maybe they are being artistic and playful, or it could, of course, mean the upcoming generation can't spell or understand grammar.

reply to post by Nanocyte




I would say writing is not an exact science any longer. It is abbreviated and I think the capitals are for emphasis. It takes 4 steps to "bold" while it take one to capitalize so speed plays a part of it. People write desperately and mainly for themselves. I think this has something to do with it too.

I was studying calligraphy the other day, and if allowed to post in calligraphy you would see artistic f's look like s', so, writing is a style, a form, another written language, perhaps.

Originally posted by InTheLight
reply to post by Nanocyte

 

Maybe they are being artistic and playful, or it could, of course, mean the upcoming generation can't spell or understand grammar.

Can they convey a message?

That is the purpose of writing, painting, dancing, communicating... after all.

This is street music. Not Dame Joan Sutherland at La Scala.
This is Tracy Chapman, playing in the subway for change.

reply to post by newcovenant


Of course they can relay a message if you are not biased enough to learn to decipher it.

Short answer... No Child Left Behind. Another reason could be the person is using a mobile device, and you know how that goes.

reply to post by OptimusSubprime


If that's true, then we are now experiencing the changing face of communication via the written word.

reply to post by Nanocyte


Possibly the same reason people put an apostrophe where it is not supposed to go, as in "there were two dog's". This is a pet hate of mine (excuse the pun). The apostrophe is supposed to indicate ownership, as in "the dog's dinner". Even my wife makes this mistake (the apostrophe, not the dog's dinner)