"Alot" is not a word [Archive]

Josh Ray

11-21-2008, 03:35 PM

http://www.ehow.com/how_4518577_use-a-lotallotalot.html

The adverb "lot" means to a very great degree or extent. This is also usually used in the form of "a lot". Example I feel a lot better after eating the chicken soup.

The verb "allot" means to parcel out or distribute. Example You need to allot each speaker enough time to discuss their topics.

"Alot" does not exist and should never be found in your writing.

Zac C

11-21-2008, 03:46 PM

http://www.ehow.com/how_4518577_use-a-lotallotalot.html

What if i use it alot? :whistling:

Andrew McCarrick

11-21-2008, 03:51 PM

alot, a lot... its the same damn thing. Who gives a crap about how its spaced. It's alternative spelling....

M Hawkins

11-21-2008, 04:15 PM

It's alternative spelling....

No it's not. It's like spelling colour without a u. It's just wrong.

Mark Thorpe

11-21-2008, 04:20 PM

......that if applied to a CV would mean job seekers would have to continue their search for alternative employment. The lack of spelling and grammar these days is quite saddening.....

Cheers,
Mark.

Zac C

11-21-2008, 04:29 PM

Daniel Browning

11-21-2008, 04:40 PM

It's alternative spelling....

Agreed. There is no benefit in wasting all this time worrying about how things are spelled, as long as you can understand what the writer intended.

In fact, I think we waste a *lot* of time on spelling when it could be much easier. I propose a multi-year plan for making spelling *alot* easier:

In Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all.

Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.

Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

[--Mark Twain]

Shawn Booth

11-21-2008, 04:41 PM

Not only is it grammatically incorrect, many have a problem with:

there - as in, over there...
they're - compound of they are, as in they're gonna buy a RED...
their - possessive, as in, their RED camera was blown up in the SFX snafu...

Paul Hazlett

11-21-2008, 04:52 PM

this is alot of nonsense....take to the grammer forum

jimhare

11-21-2008, 04:56 PM

Proper spelling and grammar are the foundations of civilization and should be respected and preserved.

Too many on this list loose there patience to soon weather they lick it or knot...

My ninth grade English teacher must be rolling in his perfectly structured grave...

jaadgy akanni

11-21-2008, 04:59 PM

People, stop writing "more then..." or "better then..." The correct word is "THAN," with an "A". Use it when making a comparison.

THEN is an adverb of time

THAN is a conjunction used as a function word to indicate difference of kind, manner, or identity

kidrobot

11-21-2008, 05:09 PM

Jeff Kilgroe

11-21-2008, 05:26 PM

No it's not. It's like spelling colour without a u. It's just wrong.

That's funny... Some of us feel it's wrong to stick an extra u where it's not needed. I like my color just the way it is. :usd:

I guess I can tolerate those with poor grammar, especially when english is not their primary language. But what really bothers me is when people substitute letters or numbers for words. I bet many of u would agree with me? :angry03:

Lately I receive so many emails with letters and numbers all over the place. It's like reading an extended edition of a resurrected text message from '04. Anyway, I just trash those emails and don't honor them with a response. I don't care how important they may be.

Proper spelling and grammar are the foundations of civilization and should be respected and preserved.

Exactly. There are many times I have to read something on here more than once because someone wrote "there" instead of "their". I don't want to be a net Nazi or a member of the grammar police. I think that's even worse than the fashion police. But when I see multiple examples every day, of how a surprisingly large number of people don't know the difference between there, their and they're. ...To, two and too... Even desert and dessert have been an issue. I can understand missing or adding that second "s" on accident, but there's a thread around here where several people honestly didn't know the difference and it was funny as hell.

Petr Dvorak

11-21-2008, 10:13 PM

I use alot alot :biggrin:

jimhare

11-21-2008, 10:35 PM

......that if applied to a CV would mean job seekers would have to continue their search for alternative employment. The lack of spelling and grammar these days is quite saddening.....

Cheers,
Mark.

Absolutely right. And not just in writing.

I've been in meetings where people use phrases such as "more better" and one guy even said "stuff and stuff..."

Needless to say they don't instill a lot of confidence.

GlennChan

11-21-2008, 10:41 PM

Proper spelling and grammar are the foundations of civilization and should be respected and preserved.
I disagree. :) Proper spelling and grammar has not helped human problems like war. Humans will still occasionally do terrible things to one another... even if we had perfect grammar.

I think that sometimes language is used to create barriers for others. When it comes to academia (and other fields), there is a high level of complex sentences and big words. (Heck, lets throw in the word verbiage.) This creates the illusion that the academics know what the hell they're talking about. And sometimes this lets them cloak the fact that their ideas are untested and possibly bogus.

The same criticism can be made about technical presentations when it comes to film/video. I've seen some papers and presentations where a lot of graphs and big words are thrown around, only to arrive at some questionable conclusions. e.g. there is a paper on Bayer being inferior to 3-chip capture... or a claim that bayer has 1/8th the resolution of 3-chip. One only has to look at existing equipment to see that there are some of the best cameras use Bayer (especially dSLRs), and resolution is way beyond 1/8th. And I think that language helps hide the fact that the conclusions are sometimes out of touch with reality.
But some people will be fooled into thinking that the speaker actually knows what the heck they're talking about. And beware of people speaking at SMPTE events... some people know what they're talking about, and some people don't. You won't figure it out based on the speaker's grammar.

And if it means anything, I'm a Canadian who prefers spelling color without a u.

Craig Ryan

11-22-2008, 12:28 AM

Grammar is an interesting thing when it comes to a "tech" forum; we use so many words and especially abbreviations that aren't typically found in regular dictionaries. Examples include "uprezzing", "downrezzing", and the like.

As long the message is clear, and comprehensible, then I have no qualms with new words or alternate spellings. My favorite of all though, is funnest.

Craig W. Bickerstaff

11-22-2008, 12:31 AM

Priyesh P.

11-22-2008, 12:35 AM

Agreed. There is no benefit in wasting all this time worrying about how things are spelled, as long as you can understand what the writer intended.

In fact, I think we waste a *lot* of time on spelling when it could be much easier. I propose a multi-year plan for making spelling *alot* easier:

In Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all.

Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.

Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

[--Mark Twain]

I luv tis! Marwelus!

Mark Thorpe

11-22-2008, 01:08 AM

Hans von Sonntag

11-22-2008, 01:20 AM

Personally I love well written text. Nevertheless, there are many contributing to this forum who are not native english writers. Like myself we entirely rely on you the native English/Amercan because we learn while reading.

If you don't want to be bothered with words like "alot" please be a model in this regard.

Kind Regards,

Hans

Hans von Sonntag

11-22-2008, 01:37 AM

Any laguage has its difficulties, some more some less. Some rules are tideous like in German the constantly usage of the caps-key. Because of this and the English model in beginning nouns not with a capital letter this ill-manner is drifting into the Germn language like the pest.

IMO, lazy wrinting causes laziness in thinking. The most focused posts are written in exemplary English. Expertise needs a wide horizon - including writing skills.

Hans

JanneJansson

11-22-2008, 01:53 AM

I'ts nto imorpatet to palce leteres in rghith palce, yuo can rade it anyaway. :)

kidrobot

11-22-2008, 05:25 AM

Janne, it is if a machine will read your text out loud :)

Mark Phelan

11-22-2008, 05:35 AM

Whether you like it or not, people judge you by the words you use. Mistakes in emails and on forums are common, but one should always try to improve oneself. Case in point: it is not "Who" you know, but "Whom" you know.

Another fun one that people misuse all the time is "Chomping at the bit". Horses do not chomp, they "Champ at the bit".

And finally, how about "affect" and "effect". They are butchered all the time.

But I agree with the "alot" frustration. It does not help oneself to continue to show ignorance by standing up for a word that doesn't exist. Just learn the right word and use it correctly.

Mark Phelan

11-22-2008, 05:49 AM

One more thing, I am amazed and humbled by those on this forum whose native language is not English but who apologize for their poor usage. Your English is much better than my French, German, Spanish, etc.

Andrew McCarrick

11-22-2008, 06:35 AM

I'ts nto imorpatet to palce leteres in rghith palce, yuo can rade it anyaway. :)

Right, as long as the first and last letter are in the right place, it's strange, but people can actually read it without much of a problem.

GlennChan

11-22-2008, 08:46 AM

Would anyone here seriously accept a screenplay or script sent to them that was full of spelling and, or, grammatical mistakes?
For most scripts I would expect grammatical mistakes since that is how many ordinary people talk. For example, that Yoda character in Star Wars has terrible grammar. ;) I think screenwriters need to know both bad and good grammar (some characters have bad grammar, some good).

Brent J. Craig

11-22-2008, 09:27 AM

It is, I've gotten job responses in txt form...

Z

That is actually a requirement from many (sorry, I mean alot of) big employers these days. Including a txt format resume allows their hiring system to enter your info directly into their database and scan for the keywords/attributes they are looking for. It certainly beats reading 20,000 resumes!

Jeff Kilgroe

11-22-2008, 09:43 AM

For most scripts I would expect grammatical mistakes since that is how many ordinary people talk. For example, that Yoda character in Star Wars has terrible grammar. ;) I think screenwriters need to know both bad and good grammar (some characters have bad grammar, some good).

Er... The dialogue within the script doesn't really count. Actually that's a whole different discussion in itself. Some producers / studios / directors don't even want to see stylized dialogue in a script. They wish to leave it up to the director and talent to add their own flavor.

When it comes to the script itself, I prefer they have as few spelling errors as possible. Scripts are a different animal though and it's hard to dictate grammar, due to the rather short-handed literary form. If we look at other forms of writing, some types need to be correct in the form of spelling and grammar -- technical writing is one of these. More artistic forms like novelized fiction, can vary. A lot of it comes down to a writer's own style. Proper spelling still matters for non-dialogue portions as does the proper use of often confused words like "there", "their" and "they're". Beyond that grammar is not that important within the more creative forms. Ever read J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books? Grammatically, they are dreadful. But they are still easy to read and she tells a decent story for all ages. Not to mention the fact that she and Scholastic have sold tens of millions of copies.

donatello b

11-22-2008, 09:56 AM

perhaps spelling should be added to posting rules ? ...
more then X# words not spelled correctly = you're out of here !! BANNED ??

Brent J. Craig

11-22-2008, 10:18 AM

perhaps spelling should be added to posting rules ? ...
more then X# words not spelled correctly = you're out of here !! BANNED ??

Right. Having a grammar gestapo would be great! (sarcasm)

If someone has something valuable to contribute here, I would rather have them share it, no matter how difficult the english language may be for them.

Preventing our friends from around the world from posting accomplishes nothing and would greatly change the international character of our community.

kidrobot

11-22-2008, 11:00 AM

more then X# words

That's almost funny.

Jeff Kilgroe

11-22-2008, 05:57 PM

perhaps spelling should be added to posting rules ? ...
more then X# words not spelled correctly = you're out of here !! BANNED ??

Don't tempt me. :devil:

Mark Thorpe

11-22-2008, 09:11 PM

I wonder who will get the bawl rolling......oops!!

Cheers,
Mark.

Steven M. Bailey

11-22-2008, 09:28 PM

Language is fluid. Yesterdays slang is today's proper English. I don't mind as much the grammatical problems as my mind is pretty much a mess anyways. What I have more trouble with, is calling a technical center and finding out that the person on the other line has such a terribly strong accent and poor grip of the English language that I cannot solve the problem for which I called. I have no problem working with people who are learning English as a second language in the field, as there are many ways to communicate, but why must they answer the phones.:angry03:

Colloquial English I believe is acceptable within this non-formal reduser environment. I also believe that alot (not all obviously) of the most creative people have a difficult time coloring inside of the lines.

When it comes to the grammar police I find myself reminded as to the differences between ignorance and indifference. As in "I don't know" and "I don't care". :innocent: :shifty:

Brian J.M. Rytel

11-23-2008, 12:26 AM

In Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all.

Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.

Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

[--Mark Twain]
Looks like something between Swedish and Icelandic, which strangely enough are modern languages. They, for the most part, use English grammar structures, we could just all switch over to those languages. We really don't need all the Latinization from the French and the Romans anyway.

"coherent spelling in ?us? throughout the English-speaking world.

Andrew Kimery

11-23-2008, 02:02 AM

Maybe it is just the old dog in me but if I have people working for me I want them to have a grasp on the grammar handle. If for whatever reason they would be required to send in a field report or promotional dossier then it should be presented in a professional manner, clearly written and with correct spelling. Would anyone here seriously accept a screenplay or script sent to them that was full of spelling and, or, grammatical mistakes?

Cheers,
Mark.
There is a difference between communicating on an internet forum and communicating in an official business manor though. I mean, sometimes I visit RedUser in my bathrobe but that doesn't mean I wear it to work. Well, if I'm working from home I wear it sometimes but if I leave the apartment I don't wear it.

-A

Mark Thorpe

11-23-2008, 03:36 AM

Manner or Manor, that is the question?

There are multiple tributaries one could take this discussion. Fact of the matter is I like the written word to be written well, period. I can understand that native non Anglophones may have problems writing English and that is more than acceptable, heck, I speak fluent French but ask me to write grammatically correct French and I would be lost.

In an industry where we play with light, cast spells with diction and create illusions with actions I only feel it best that those who wish to project themselves intellectually do so armed with the knowledge and understanding of their given language. I am not too sure if that is something too hard to ask for or not.

At the end of the day there is always the spell check function.

Cheers,
Mark.

Johann V

11-23-2008, 04:03 AM

There are far more serious things going on in the world today.

I am of course talking about people who write "would of", "should of" and "could of". You never see "they of" though. Maybe it just doesn't roll off the tongue as easily.

Every time I read those, I shiver, and it leaves a tiny scar in my soul. And I'm not even a native speaker!
But it seems to have become quite popular to write like that among this generation, and all over the world; my little sister is a really bright girl, and knows how to write, but when I saw her chatting with a friend online, she used horrible grammar and spelling. I asked her why she didn't write properly, and she just told me it'd be "uncool". :waaa:

Well, I hope this trend reverses, and knowledge becomes fashionable once again...:matrix:

Jojo

Petr Dvorak

11-23-2008, 10:35 PM

I miss online dictionary directly on forum

Andrew Kimery

11-25-2008, 11:17 AM

Manner or Manor, that is the question?
.
.
.
At the end of the day there is always the spell check function.

Cheers,
Mark.
Obviously we need a "meaning check function" because I spelled the wrong word perfectly.:biggrin:

-A

kidrobot

11-25-2008, 12:27 PM

Well, I hope this trend reverses, and knowledge becomes fashionable once again...:matrix:

Jojo

I think we'll see "Of a nice day!" sooner than people picking up on "should've, would've and could've". If you break down what you're trying to say, you'd never come up with the word "of" belonging in there.

"Could you have done that?" "Yes, I could've done it." Could've as in Could have and nothing else.

Also, I think a good rule for "then" and "than" is that if you're not sure, use "than". Especially on the forums because you're most likely comparing cameras. E is for evil bad spelling.