Wednesday 26 October 2011

Predictive Text and Language Abuse

BBC's Phil Dawkes raised me from my slumbers with his report of a goal to Everton in their battle against ten-man Chelsea. What stirred me wasn't the football but the confused use of the English language. Here's the offending piece:

"Everton goal: Just when it was looking like Everton we're heading out of the Carling Cup, Louis Saha drags them back in. Seamus Coleman's cross is headed in at the near post by the Frenchman and Goodison erupts. We could well be looking at an extra half hour here."

The 'were' and 'we're' confusion seems to be more and more prevalent and it beggars the question, "Is this predictive text (PT) at it's worst?"

Perhaps the Phil is sitting, adding content on his iPad, and in the frenzy of the game misses (just like me at times) the failings of PT. Either way - early night postponed :)

Just for fun, if you have PT have a go at entering a few random keystrokes and see what you get. Here's my message to the world:

Gumshoe Rhein wickets

Hot nightie

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

That has made sense of a number of errors I see when people send me messages or write from one of those pad things.

Thanks

Jenni said...

A friend of mine sent her husband a message whilst on the ferry which had been delayed,to let him know that she was on her way home. It read "Bomb on the boat,may be late."