[tashoecraft]

I think with just the shear amount of messaging that is occurring in todays age combined with the lines being blurred between work and home makes communication rapidly evolve. What one things is clear communication with no ambiguity, another might disagree.

An example is responding back to a message with "Ok.". I see many over, say, 50 do this much more often, but to many under, say 30, this is taken as very passive aggressive.

[bavila]

> An example is responding back to a message with "Ok.". I see many over, say, 50 do this much more often, but to many under, say 30, this is taken as very passive aggressive.

I can see how some might take a single "Ok." that way, but it probably really does depend a lot on context and the nature of the relationship. I tend to acknowledge most people's comments in a very mater-of-fact manner, but I feel adding a simple "thank you" (as in "Ok, thank you.") helps to dispel the raw bluntness of a plain "Ok."

"Please", "sorry", and "thank you"--these magic words can work wonders.

[neodymiumphish]

To be fair, I'm over 30 and I'd wonder whether "Ok." was passive aggressive in-person or online.

[Aeolun]

It’s a tone of voice thing I think.

[elwell]

> An example is responding back to a message with "Ok.". I see many over, say, 50 do this much more often, but to many under, say 30, this is taken as very passive aggressive.

Definitely have experienced this.

> shear

sheer

> What one things is clear communication with no ambiguity, another might disagree.

thinks

> todays

today's

> age combined with the lines being blurred between work and home makes

age, combined with the lines being blurred between work and home, makes

> I think with just the... ...makes communication rapidly evolve

I think just the... ...makes communication rapidly evolve

> over, say, 50 do / under, say 30, this

over, say, 50 do / under, say, 30 this

> passive aggressive

passive-aggressive

[robocat]

Correcting someone’s English is usually seen as a sign of social posturing, because higher education is often related to someone’s self-perception of social status ranking. It takes a extremely skilled approach to do it without causing offence.

It is especially poor form on HN, because you cannot know whether English is their second language, or whether there are other reasons for mistakes (such as being in a hurry, having dyslexia, or having a disability.)

[koyote]

If you are a native English speaker, higher education should not be required for basic writing. There is no requirement to use complicated words, but I'd expect someone to be able to spell correctly (especially on a device with spell checking).

If you are not a native speaker, corrections are one way to learn from your mistakes and improve your English.

If you are in a hurry then maybe you should wait until you are not in a hurry before posting to HN.

I do agree that correcting someone often comes across in a bad way, but at the same time so does leaving a comment riddled with mistakes.

[setr]

I see the issue as more pretentious than anything else -- I know how to spell correctly, I have fucking spellcheck just like you do, but I don't give enough of a damn to go back through and right click every dumb typo and issue; especially when im typing on a phone or a shitty chat app with random delays

If the only thing you got from my whole post is my missed period, especially if my post was a response/argument to whatever you claimed, you're either a moron or intentionally trying to one-up me in an aspect that nobody cares about

Grammar is not a signal of intelligence in short-form communications. In long-form/formal communications, it's a minimum barrier to entry (if you can't even be assed to type your name properly, why should I bother with your 50 page paper?), but different context, different systems, different rules

[elwell]

> if you can't even be assed to type your name properly, why should I bother with your 50 page paper?

There has to be line somewhere though...

[elwell]

Sorry, it was just too hard to pass up the irony embedded in this sentence:

"What one things is clear communication with no ambiguity, another might disagree."

> It is especially poor form on HN

I totally get that I was being annoying. At same time, if there's anywhere one can indulge in the art of being overly pedantic, is it not here?

> having dyslexia, or having a disability

In that case, I would feel bad for jokingly correcting them. Yes, it is hard to know the person behind the keyboard.

[viraptor]

The worst case for fixing someone's typo is when you know their first language isn't English and assume that's where the mistake comes from. 99% of the time I make mistakes due to swipe/predictive input changing something I don't notice. Yet it gets pointed out by someone repeatedly writing "should of" or asking for simple spelling advice.

[Phrodo_00]

As an ESL speaker, I appreciate people who make an effort to correct me.

[elwell]

> As an ESL speaker, I appreciate people who make an effort to correct me.

A flawless sentence!

[Phrodo_00]

:)

[Aeolun]

Depends on what you are correcting I think. Correcting shear to sheer was the immediate thing I mentally did when reading the message, because if you don’t, people will keep doing this wrong in more important settings too.

All the punctuation is less important and I wouldn’t really bother with it.

[scubbo]

> passive-aggressive

Well, you weren't lying...

[elwell]

Irony is in the eye of beholder

[Aeolun]

Sorry, the last few corrections didn’t make any sense even after correction.

[Izkata]

Muphry's law in action. On the second-to-last, they moved a comma (wrongly), and completely missed the major typo (possibly just autocorrected back to the wrong thing). It should be: "over, say, 50 yo" ("yo" being short for "years old"), and the other half should always have a comma after "30" (the one after "say" is optional depending on where they put pauses when they speak).

[elwell]

Here is the original text:

> I see many over, say, 50 do this much more often

Here is your 'corrected' version:

> I see many over, say, 50 yo this much more often

Any-way, i was indiccating the nead for conssisstency, not absulute corectness,,,