- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
I typically try to decipher it. Who knows, it might be a legit question about something and they're looking for advice or have some questions on how things work.
- Someone made a thread, but you barely understand anything. What do you reply?
Again, I try to understand it as best I can, maybe try to use context to try and figure out with what they're saying. Sometimes looking to other people's interpretations helps. Sometimes I'll ask the OP to be a little clearer and that helps.
- People having issues with writing: How do you deal with them and what do you suggest them?
If it's in terms of writer's block, I tell them to take a break from writing for a bit and come back to it in a minute or two, refresh their brain. I'm not very helpful in terms of trying to assist someone in their ideas or some such thing; I usually just try to point someone to a thesaurus or see if I can come up with a similar word for what they're trying to get across.
- Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?
No. The ONLY time I'll correct someone on their grammar is if they insult someone else's grammar first... and still somehow have the nerve to not double-check their own spelling and punctuation before posting a correction to someone else.
- What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
I learned that I hate the Finnish language for its ulmats and its (in my opinion) superfluous use of repeated letters. However, I love the living hell out of how it sounds to my ear, and I'm trying my best to learn the language, even if it is currently kicking my a**.
even people who know how to write well don't always get everything right when it comes to command of english grammar. like, when i'm watching a movie or reading a book and a character says something with dialogue like "she's the one that liked apples" instead of "she's the one who liked apples" i just chuckle to myself. even professionals get it wrong sometimes
or it's intentional. After all, it's not very realistic if every single character in a book speaks with perfect grammar, since people in real life don't all speak perfect English, either.
or it's not intentional.
Especially if the character is written to be educated and well spoken.
I'm okay with people who can't use proper english.
The only time I'm actually annoyed is when ppl tlk lIk dis.
Other grammar errors, like missing a few punctuation marks, no comma,
I'm alright with that. As long as it's readable.
And I don't really correct anyone's grammar. If they type like that,
someone's going to correct them eventually. Besides, half the time
someone does correct another's grammar, they react violently.
- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
I reply to it as I would anyone else.
If I have trouble understanding a word, I'll ask them what it is.
Hopefully they would clarify, or correct it x3
- Someone made a thread, but you barely understand anything. What do you reply?
Usually, I just don't reply at all.
Or, I see if they have posted anymore on the issue, and see if I could understand it better
- People having issues with writing: How do you deal with them and what do you suggest them?
As I myself can have trouble (English is my third language) I ask them if they need help.
If they really want to become better at English, and have trouble with it, there are things available to help them~
- Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?
Only if I know they're the type of person who wouldn't take it in a bad manner.
When I make a mistake, or don't know a word, I like people telling me.
Because, hey, it's only helping me improve on my spelling.
- What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
Not much, really.
I feel that on an online message board, we don't need to have extreme levels of formality in the way we type. I often use elipses or dashes to join two points together which in a more formal context should either be two separate sentences or alternatively linked by a comma or a conjunction. I feel as though when I'm posting on Gaia, it's more like writing an email to a close friend than submitting an essay to be marked. Bearing this in mind, I don't expect perfection from everyone when they post. Sometimes when I hit the reply button & reread my post, I realise that I've absent-mindedly used the incorrect word or awkward phraseology, and sometimes even made typographical errors. The edit button however is a beautiful thing which enables me to fix some of these mistakes. Except when someone quotes me & then my error is there graven in stone for eternity.
I'm not going to lie though, whilst I don't mind awkward phrasing or errata whilst posting, if someone insists on "typin liek dis 2 ask qstion" I'm automatically turned off & much less likely to actually read what they have to say. I wouldn't call them out on it, but my eyes tend to slide past posts or PMs like that. If I get an offer on one of my store items (and I specifically say that I welcome offers) which is similar to "Cloud + 50k 4 yoru item" I pretty much categorically refuse the offer, wheras if someone sends me "Would you consider taking my Cloud and 50k as a trade for your item?" I'd actually seriously consider what they have to say.
I think as we get older, we tend to be a bit more concerned about exactly what we type. I wasn't on Gaia when I was younger but I reread some of my posts from another forum based site when I was younger and I didn't have as much of a regard for checking & correction. I find some of these posts a bit painful to read.
I've moved past the stage I had as a younger and more zealous person to correct people's text if I quote them. I feel like it didn't really do anything to help others and I imagine if they really struggle with their literacy it could be disheartening. If someone specifically asked me for help with their English, either owing to challenges such as dyslexia or their not being confident with English as second language I'd be happy to oblige (though I'd rather they asked me for help with their calculus homework).
I guess to sum it up, perfection doesn't worry me too much, but I expect people to make an effort to be comprehensible. I've never had any trouble understanding people who have English as a second language even if their phraseology is a little unusual, or even those who aren't top-notch spellers (though spelling is made a lot easier these days by spell-checking plugins for most browsers), but the appearance that they are trying to conform to some kind of 100 character limit for each post by not setting out words in full & adding punctuation will usually make me disregard their post or PM.
Most terrible posts I see are people taLkiNg LiEK diS and not because of any language difficulty. I'll tell them straight that nobody wants to read trash.
On the Internet and in real life people needs to be less sensitive/touchy and take criticism when it's deserved. Posting things that takes so much effort to read wastes everyones time.
Language barriers or things like dyslexia don't bother me, and I won't comment on them unless I know the poster and know they want help with spelling/grammar.
As for the OP, your posts are fine, don't worry about it emotion_yatta
I tend to ignore threads and posts with "ppl who tlk lik dis." It sorta gives a reflection of a persons character when they post like that. That's just my opinion.
As for people who's mother tongue isn't English, I don't mind. They're probably doing a better job at writing in a different language than I ever could.
My best friend in the whole world has absolutely awful spelling and generally resorts to txt talk. I know she's capable of posting like I am now, and know all of her reasons why she doesn't. I don't really judge her for it.
So because of that, unless the person does truly strange and ignorant things (like that double i because it's 'cute' or tYpn LiEk diS), I really don't judge how people post. We all have reasons. And if it's laziness on their part, then why should I kick up a fuss about it? razz
English is not my native language, and so I completely understand if people make mistakes in grammar or spelling. If I need clarification, I'll just ask..
I can even try to read the illegible when people tell me 'this key on my keyboard is broken'.
But chatspeak is just horrible. Chatspeak is even harder for non-natives because it's so phonetic, while you learned the official language, so I need a translator for stuff like that. Result = I don't bother. Apparently they need to put in the effort to make their post 'kewl' (because that just cannot be easy!), and apparently I'm not 'kewl' enough to understand. xd
Let's see, we have people that have problems with writing.
Even though they try hard, there are always a lot of mistakes in their posts.
There are people posting with a ridiculous speed.
So fast, they don't even bother to check their posts before posting.
We have people that talk and write in a different language and learned english either in school or themselves.
And Trolls, but they're everywhere anyway.
So, I'm belonging to the people with a different mothertongue.
I can't speak english at all.
Writing, well you can probably tell, I try, but there are always mistakes I'm forgetting about or just didn't know.
Sometimes I see really rude comments to people that have many mistakes in their posts/threads.
I just think, if that person has issues with writing (such as dyslexic), their feelings get hurt.
IMO, sometimes it's just better to not reply at all if you can't handle it, instead of just posting rude statements.
So, GCD, I have a few spoons to discuss
- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
- Someone made a thread, but you barely understand anything. What do you reply?
- People having issues with writing: How do you deal with them and what do you suggest them?
- Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?
- What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
I usually reply that I didn't understand. If that person replies with a horrid english again, I tend to give up. My english is just not good enough to guess the words xD
- Someone made a thread, but you barely understand anything. What do you reply?
First I try to understand what the Thread is about and reply to the topic.
If I can't figure it out, I don't reply.
- People having issues with writing: How do you deal with them and what do you suggest them?
I treat them like normal users. Because it's not their faulth they do have that issue.
I usually don't suggest anything, because all I'd suggest are things I should do more often myself. OTL
- Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?
Nope xD
Except I see people trying to type in german.
- What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
I'm too lazy to learn from others.
But my english probably improved a bit xd
I laughed when I read the post because I thought you were making fun of the Asian thing - where their L's sound like R's.
but
- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
I respond, unless it's offensive in some way
- Someone made a thread, but you barely understand anything. What do you reply?
I won't really comment in it if I don't understand it.
- People having issues with writing: How do you deal with them and what do you suggest them?
I suggest they read more and practice writing more?
- Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?
no
- What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
I had a chick tell me , because i used There instead of They're she decided she wouldn't go on reading my explanation to a certain subject. Being that English is my 2nd Language , spanish being the first i try my hardest to work on my spelling and grammar. I will admit my grammar is horrible at times, i'm not excusing it it's crap. I have no room to tell other's that there grammar is bad.
As long as i can read what you're saying or can some what understand i don't have a problem at all. It's the text talk i have a problem with . People who simply blame Dyslexia need to actually look up what it is .
I have the same issue here. English isn't my first langue either and spell check is my friend but it doesn't check grammar or misuse words so emo I also tend to think faster than I type so I use the wrong words all the time. I try to double check but I over do it since I reply to so many things. Then I get tired and my writing gets really, really bad. Most people don't call me out on it too much. So I'm very thankful.
- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
depends how bad it is. sometimes i'll just reply normally. sometimes i copy and paste what they put into my IM conversation and laugh at it with someone because i'm terrible. gonk only if it's like funny txt speak or something though. not if i can tell they genuinely have problems with english for whatever reason.
- Someone made a thread, but you barely understand anything. What do you reply?
i'll probably just read others' replies and be amused. unless they're asking for help and nobody else has helped them out yet.
- People having issues with writing: How do you deal with them and what do you suggest them?
i just talk to them. i wouldn't suggest anything unless they ask for help. then i'd probably look up some websites they could use.
- Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?
generally, no. i correct my friends when i see them using a wrong word like then/than there/their/they're your/you're because if it's a friend they won't get mad and attack me and think i'm a douche. sweatdrop
i'm also tempted to correct people when i see them criticising others' spelling/grammar but getting things wrong in their own posts. (which is hypocritical, considering my beautiful all-lowercase, right? emotion_awesomebut there's a difference between completely disregarding capitalisation for style and just getting things wrong because you don't know any better.)
- What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
not all that much, i guess.
i've noticed online when people talk to me in 'engrish' (ie. english isn't their first language and they get a lot of grammar wrong) i just auto reply in the same way. emo which is totally not helpful, i know. it just happens.
- Someone sends you a PM in horrible written english. What's your reaction?
depends how bad it is. sometimes i'll just reply normally. sometimes i copy and paste what they put into my IM conversation and laugh at it with someone because i'm terrible. gonk only if it's like funny txt speak or something though. not if i can tell they genuinely have problems with english for whatever reason.
I do this too. 8D emotion_brofist I'm a horrible person.
Sometimes you'll come across someone who has a combination of terrible spelling and at the same time is endeavouring to insult as many people as they possibly can. At this point I'll usually copy-paste their post to whomever I'm currently chatting to and we'll have a good giggle over how idiotic they sound.
"Do you correct people all the time when you see typos?"
Very rarely, the one incident I can think of off the top of my head is when someone repeatedly used the word "alot" in their post. That was too good a chance to miss.
Most of the time I hope that better use of the English language in response to their post will gradually encourage them to improve their own spelling.
"What did you learn from other Gaians regarding languages and cultures?
I've picked up the American usage of the word 'pants', and I have to catch myself on the off chance that I'm about to use it in a conversation. For the English, 'pants' generally means underwear and I get a few weird looks if I accidentally use it instead of 'trousers'.
Also Americans don't like our 'u's. It makes me sad. crying
For the most part, I don't actually know that many people who have spelling troubles. I actually get a lot of corrections from my online friends when I mix up words and use 'then' instead of 'than' or vice versa. Personally I appreciate it when I'm corrected since I'd rather learn from my mistakes with friends than with my manager.
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