MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
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Why you should never, ever use two spaces after a period
By Michael Wolraich on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 2:34pm |By Farhad Manjoo
Can I let you in on a secret? Typing two spaces after a period is totally, completely, utterly, and inarguably wrong
And yet people who use two spaces are everywhere, their ugly error crossing every social boundary of class, education, and taste. You'd expect, for instance, that anyone savvy enough to read Slate would know the proper rules of typing, but you'd be wrong; every third e-mail I get from readers includes the two-space error. (In editing letters for "Dear Farhad," my occasional tech-advice column, I've removed enough extra spaces to fill my forthcoming volume of melancholy epic poetry, The Emptiness Within.) The public relations profession is similarly ignorant; I've received press releases and correspondence from the biggest companies in the world that are riddled with extra spaces. Some of my best friends are irredeemable two spacers, too, and even my wife has been known to use an unnecessary extra space every now and then (though she points out that she does so only when writing to other two-spacers, just to make them happy).
What galls me about two-spacers isn't just their numbers.It's their certainty that they're right.
URL:
http://www.slate.com/id/2281146/
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Comments
I think Farhad needs a new hobby. I say give him a box of toothpicks and see what he can do with them. I'm a haphazard spacer, FWIW. Depends on how the sentences look in Preview. I do love Ellipses, though---periods in groups of three with a single space in between. On that I'm pretty rigid. (Oh, and dashes, too. I love dashes, but that's a whole other issue.)
by Ramona on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 4:14pm
The trouble is that most of us learned to type based on the old fixed-font approach, and we've been doing it a long time, so two spaces look correct to us. Now, we're a shoddy about practices here at dag, so I'll spare you the whip, but Farhad is correct that double spacing variable-width fonts violates publishing standards.
by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:35pm
Maybe the trouble is that the vast majority of people who engage in the physical act of typsetting (typists) established a new convention. A much smaller group of punctuation geeks like the old one better and would prefer to see folks switch back.
But Farhad hasn't answered the all important question: What about courier? Did he think about that?
by kgb999 on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 10:31pm
He does actually mention Courier:
I still can't buy his argument. I think, even here, two spaces between sentences looks better.
by Ramona on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 11:00pm
Dang ... missed his parenthetic nod to courier.
I agree with you on style. Breaks up the sentences much more nicely - especially in longer paragraphs. That said, I'm unapologetically inconsistent and claim the right to unlimited punctuation creativity (and to make up words. also.).
by kgb999 on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 11:29pm
Me too. Blogging is much more free-style than writing for publications and should be given some slack. I have more problems with uncorrected typos than I do with punctuation. Sometimes there are so many typos in a comment it stops making sense. We use punctuation for clarity and if it's clear the marks have done their jobs.
I like to use punctuation marks as visuals -- putting stops and pauses in the places where they would be if I were talking -- and I like reading other pieces that do the same thing. I'm not much for rules, but you might notice I did add spaces between the dashes above. Can't say I'll always do it, but I'm giving it a try.
by Ramona on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:06am
Yes, I've been using two spaces after sentences for way, way more than half my life. I used a typewriter for more years than I've used a computer and it's hard to make a change. Luckily, I don't plan on changing, so this whole conversation won't be keeping me awake at night. ;)
(See that smiley at the end of that sentence? I really don't like those, either, and they're not in any stylebook, but they do make a statement that says "Keeping it light here". I don't like LOL, either, but it's a visual that says "You made a funny that requires more than just a "Ha ha". Rigid rules fly out the window when we're free-styling in the blogosphere. It's a whole different world in here.)
by Ramona on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:31am
PS Articleman is a defiant 2-spacer, so I linked to this article partly for his benefit.
by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:37pm
W e l l , i n t h a t c a s e . . . .
by quinn esq on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:44pm
I was thinking about this, I mean I read this article a week ago I think although time is not my forte as they say.
I probably lost soooo many points in college after reading folks like Chaucer who could not spell any better than Shakespeare two centuries later.
Here are the rules.
So Joyce and Faulkner just said: SCREW YOU
hahahahahaha
So my worry is that we already have software that translates; like those Chinese Potters who would advertise as blogs at Cafe.
We will end up with software that will translate our comments at Huffpo and Beast and NYT to make us all pallatable to the corporate message.
THE END
by Richard Day on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:56pm
Warning: You have used 18 of your allotted extra spaces. Once you reach 20, you will have to purchase a subscription to Genghis the Grammarian!, a bi-monthly compilation of philology rants, fashion tips, and disturbing photographs.
by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:59pm
Phrenology??? And photos like THIS???
by we are stardust on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:18am
"I know !! Somebody's been erasing !!" - Mrs. Williams, the typing teacher in my High School.
by cmaukonen on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:07pm
On the other hand, I'm grateful for the reminder. I write sometimes for the local Free Press, and the editor told me that rule once,and I swear to God I'd forgotten it. She must get sooooo sick of deleting this Space Cadet's extra spaces. Probably mumbles, "Spaced out idiot. She's just takin' up space. God, give me strength to withstand space cases like this. One day, I sear, it'll be 'Powie! Right in the kisser! and staight into space!'
(yes; I did have to go back and delete every single goddam extra space...) ;o)
Hey Genghis: since you don't set type here, can we stick with TWO????
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:32pm
You get 20 extra spaces per month, and then we start charging you.
by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:37pm
Arrrrrgggghhhh! Just kill me charge me now! My brain is Headroom/Spaceroom with one tiny inch of grey matter! See? Can't.do.it. Did I ever tell you I held a brain once? I forget...
By the way, Mr. Genghis of the Steppes, Mr. Stardust was very impressed with your blushing apology on my thing-a-ma-bob diary...Geronimo! (Thanks, you darling one inch...) The man said it actually gave him quite a lift, given that so many are utterly bereft of accountability and few can admit mistakes, and even fewer can apologize.
Buuuuuuuuuuut; he also says it'll be a cold day in hell before he comments here again. ;o)
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 6:04pm
In that case, he's banned. ;)
by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:02pm
Genghis thinks Mr. Stardust has good buns! Oh...dear....'banned'...not 'bunned'....never mind...
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:07pm
I read this.
I shall space my ideas in any manner in which I wish because I am and American and I believe in life, liberty and punctuation.
SO FUCK ALL OF YOU!
Just hyperbole of course.
I do not mean this in a BADWAY of course!
by Richard Day on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 5:44pm
Yeah.....you KNOW there is a blogger here who types like that, Dick. And after all, Genghis is just urging us toward a Spatial Singularity.
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 6:06pm
hahahahahahahahaha
Ahhhh yes, the singularity.
May we all aspire to be physicists. hahahaha
by Richard Day on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 6:23pm
Larry believes we should leave more spaces between floors as well .
I think he's right .
by quinn esq on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:12pm
THERE YA GO!
Although we only get 400 or so 'characters'.
You know Q, you are a character.
I mean that means there are a finite number of characters in the universe.
hahahaha
the end
by Richard Day on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:16pm
All he meant was so there'd be more room for some of Zennish Somnabulists to belch, fart and snore, whiile others are out there bakin' your bread and dancing for the revolution.
There's a reason they call it a crawl space, dude. Post-modern-post-structuralize that! (And throw in 'eponymous', too; makes ya look smart as all giddy-up, I hear....) I couldn't shoe-horn it in, so...)
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:25pm
Good find, Genghis. Farhad's right about the spacing after periods, but he avoids the thorniest punctuational minefield of all: use and misuse of the hyphen/dash.
There are at least five lookalike symbols of slightly different length and purpose, so it's hard to blame civilians for mixing them up. I find they can be practically boiled down to two: the hyphen (-), which can link two words together, break long words at the end of a line, or serve as minus sign, and the dash (--) to signal a pause or interjection.
I follow the New York Times style of putting a space before and after typing the two hyphens. It makes it visually obvious it's not a hyphen, and has the added advantage that MS Word or OpenOffice will convert the combination into an en-dash (like this – ). Dagblog won't do the conversion, unfortunately. It's equally acceptable to use a longer em-dash, with no spaces around it, but I don't like how that looks so I'm not telling how to make one.
Don't get me started on ellipsis, except to say NO space between the periods.
by acanuck on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:47pm
By the way, I still don't see any justification for "but nor."
Grumble, grumble. Hey, you kids, get off my lawn!
by acanuck on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 7:50pm
Good lord. . . Is there really such a thing as a thorny punctuational minefield? Is there nowhere safe anymore?
(I put spaces between the ellipsis periods. i like the way it looks. So shoot me.)
(But I only allowed one space between sentences this time. I should get points for that.)
(I do seem to have a problem with parens, though. I'm working on it.)
by Ramona on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 8:31pm
Hey look, I'm a typographical curmudgeon. Go ahead, express your grammatical creativity.
But be warned: If you keep putting spaces in your ellipses, one of these days you'll end up with two periods on one line and one on the next. Then all your former friends here will laugh derisively at you, denying you the comments you crave. In your shame, you will confine your posting to fdl or even little green footballs.
Until it happens again. More derisive laughter, more shunning. Then you'll return to dagblog, sheepishly avoiding all use of ellipses -- even when the context demands them. Everyone will notice, and there will be more derision. The downward spiral will continue until ...
Or maybe not. Maybe people here will accept your eccentricities, cut you some slack. Maybe ...
by acanuck on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 9:22pm
Ho hum. I should care. But please, not fdl. Don't even go there. This is no fun. I don't feel creative. I feel stifled.
Daisy. . . Daisy. . .give. . .me. . .your. . .answer. . .
too.
by Ramona on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 9:37pm
Well, we can understand poor Genghis's mentioning it (Oh; are you going to challenge the 'apostrophe and S after 'Genghis'?) (New School, Old School...fuck school...and note the spacing) because the poor dear has to set the type for every blog and comment we write. But you?
As a member of the Punctuation Police? Now...we won't call you anal per se, but we might suggest you check out this product.
I'll duck defending FDL; it has much to criticize and much to praise. But at least it's a very poplular site to diss, much like breathing out RedState.com. Gets the average centrist Dems hyperventilating. Cool.
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 9:47pm
Punctuation Police?
Realize, stardust, that I come by my pedantry professionally. Decades spent correcting other writers' grammar, punctuation, factual accuracy and logic. Here at dagblog, I really keep that habit in check, merely pointing out the occasional headline typo. (There's one on the main page right now that I chose to let slide, by the way.)
I've seldom if ever corrected anyone's punctuation, or spelling errors in the body of a post or comment. The only reason I brought up dashes here is because punctuation was the topic of the post. And since you ask, "Genghis's" is totally correct. Unlike Genghis himself.
Unfortunately, amazon has run out of that product you recommend. Fortunately, I already have a six-month supply in stock.
by acanuck on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 11:02pm
Need s
moar
sp
ace
by quinn esq on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 11:06pm
LOL! I do think it's helpful to mention typos and spelling errors, really. Punctuation can sliiiiiiide right by me. Couldn't tell ya what an Elipse is if my life depended on it. And you got me curious; some writers use just an apostrophe with names ending in S; gets a little confusing, but here's what the Wiki says:
However, some contemporary writers omit the extra s in all cases, and The Chicago Manual of Style allows this as an “alternative practice”.[18] Generally, The Chicago Manual of Style is in line with the majority of current guides, and recommends the traditional practice but provides for several exceptions to accommodate spoken usage, including the omission of the extra s after a polysyllabic word ending in a sibilant.[19] Rules that modify or extend the standard principle have included the following:
Similar examples of notable names ending in an s that are often given a possessive apostrophe with no additional s include Dickens and Williams.
Also, I thought you were expressly 'playing' the Punctuation Police. Didn't mean to offend. Hope the silly seeds help.
by we are stardust on Fri, 05/06/2011 - 11:38pm
No offense taken, stardust. I was "playing" the Punctuation Police, but half the joke (to me) was that those are indeed rules I follow. Then I got to play the offended pedant -- almost as much fun. Because pedantry, pretension and self-righteousness are character traits that lurk just below my surface, and they like to be let out from time to time to run around the yard.
Friends and family realize I'm a know-it-all, but I'm right just often enough that they keep asking serious but obscure questions. If I don't know the answer, I make some plausible shit up, then slowly add increasingly outrageous detail until they catch on. Great fun; they seem to enjoy it too. Unless they're just humoring the old fart that they find his schtick funny! Hmmm.
In writing, to simplify things -- and because there is no consensus rule -- I always add the apostrophe-S, even if I wouldn't actually pronounce it. We write "through" and "chateaux," despite the fact half those letters are not pronounced. Why draw the line at Jesus's?
by acanuck on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 3:12am
Proust got around the problem by never ending a sentence.
by Flavius on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:13am
This my be my favorite comment ever!
by Orlando on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:39pm
Hmm, while we're talking grammar, does anyone have any advice, or suggestions or, well, consolation, regarding the correct use of commas, around here? Because, personally, I have this awful, irresistible, compulsive affliction that involves putting these things, commas, that is, everywhere, absolutely every conceivable spot, in a sentence. I just, at this point, don't know, you see, quite what to do about it. One of these days, I fear these people will come after me, the comma police...
by Obey on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:49am
Is this where you lower your head whensomeone explains the song was about 'karma', not 'commas'? LOL! And you squeak out, "Never mind......................."
Now Comma Man, my personal fear (of which I have many) is of the Parentheses Pigs. A Big Famous Author told me (rather arrogantly, I thought) that my writing was good enough (she didn't say 'good enough for whom...) but that I should use so many of those parentheses and asides (what's writing for if not to talk to yourself, pretending it's to the readers?) I ask you?
by we are stardust on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 11:39am
If you don't mind, rather than "Comma Man", I prefer the old moniker Comma Chameleon personally...
As for parentheses - yes it's much more natural. The stream of consciousness for most people is more like the choppy seas of consciousness - waves and cross-currents going all over the place - and that should be reflected in the prose. The most annoying writer I ever read - Albert Cohen - had this idea that the stream of consciousness was best represented by eschewing all punctuation and just letting the sentence run on and on for a whole chapter. Totally unreadable. And wrong. Thoughts are self-contained clearly delimited wholes, though they can contain other thoughts as parts and sometimes those parts try to leave their proper home and run off on a tangent to join the circus, whence the need for parentheses to keep them in their place.
Whoever invented parentheses had a profound understanding for human psychology...
by Obey on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 11:54am
Well, I'd only mind because we don't usually get to choose our own nicknames, but maybe these are more like 'titles', which are arguably different, so....
Thanks for the explanation on ( these dudes ) (such a long word for them!): my thoughts often splinter off, being naturally circus-carney loving, so knowing it's okay to hem 'em in a bit with the little curves makes me feel downright...satisfied.
However, I'd imagined you might be thinking along the lines of 'Comma Kaze', myself...
by we are stardust on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 1:10pm
Nice find! I like it!!
by Obey on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 4:31pm
Just when Obey gets me feeling guilty and/or defensive about using so many commas in my championship run-on sentences, [nobody uses more commas than me] you bring up parentheses. I know I aint got no style but then I didn't know that there was such a thing as a style book. Gonna get me one a them.
by A Guy Called LULU on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 12:05pm
Yez.
Comma police, arrest this man
He talks in maths
He buzzes like a fridge
He's like a detuned radio
Comma police, arrest this girl
Her Hitler jargon is
Making me feel ill
And we have crashed her party
This is what you get
This is what you get
This is what you get when you mess with us
Go pug.
by bwakfat on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 4:06pm
The chicken likes the Radiohead, yez?
Awesome! ;0)
by Obey on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 4:30pm
Well, yez, with apologies to et. al. for paraphrasing to poke fun at people that talk in maths and er, jargon.
I always pays attentions to pugs that talks in maths.
by bwakfat on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 4:42pm
Actually, my real pet peeve about space at dagblog is the paragraph breaks. I realize that the software, for reasons known only to itself, often creates double spaces between paragraphs when you cut-and-paste, but just fix it, people! The wide breaks look terrible, and I end up having to fix them whenever I put a post on the main page. It's a pain.
by Michael Wolraich on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 1:40pm
"...but just fix it, people!"
I have tried.I just tried here between this line and the quote. It is probably easy but I don't know how to do it. Since it is a front page issue though, I doubt that my inability to do so will ever be a problem for you.
by A Guy Called LULU on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 1:56pm
Ah sorry, lulu. Our front-paging is admittedly capricious. I like your writing and will make sure to give it attention.
It looks like you got the paragraph break right. The easiest way to fix a paragraph break is to delete the break and hit the return key.
by Michael Wolraich on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 2:52pm
HA! As if you have merely a single pet peeve.
by bwakfat on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 2:01pm
My other pet peeve is being contradicted
by Michael Wolraich on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 2:53pm
No, it isn't.
by acanuck on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 4:27pm
Excellent. Equal time for uncontradictions.
by bwakfat on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 4:43pm
Yay! Punctuation thread! For the record, I've been a one-spacer for about twenty years--ever since computers came into fashion. It was hard to make the switch--for about thirty seconds. After that, I never looked back. But unless I'm proofreading a document, I generally don't notice whether there are two spaces or only one. Abuse of elipses bothers me a little bit, but what really irritates me is incomplete or incoherent sentences. Can subject-verb-object really be that challenging?
by Orlando on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:45pm
Well, some people have a way with words, and some people not have way, (((IMO))).
by miguelitoh2o on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 10:29pm
Please could you another way say it? Confused I am no fault of you or lemur.
by SleepinJeezus on Sun, 05/08/2011 - 4:24pm
Sorry i can't join you in your new hoorah about today's grammatical fads. They are always changing and always will... nothing I wish to concern myself with. If it ages me so bit., so does my lack of enthusiasm for twitter and limited use of facebook. When I look around it is clear that our culture has more and more stress to deal with causing us a multitude of issues... spaces after periods? give us a break:)
by synchronicity on Sat, 05/07/2011 - 9:54pm
Huh. I had no idea there was a one space rule after periods. Hmmm. I was under the impression I could take up all the space I wanted to after menopause.
Anyhoo, I shall have to try out this one space trick. Do I like it? Can I get used to it? Oops. Some habits are hard to break.
by wabby on Sun, 05/08/2011 - 4:04pm
=D
I set type for a living. Professionally we use one space, and have since the advent of offset printing or thereabouts. Amateurs (anyone other than some hack like me that sets type for a living, among other fun things) can do whatever the heck they like.
Don't sweat the small things peoples, unless you are a drone that works in publishing, I do not think it matters.
by bwakfat on Sun, 05/08/2011 - 4:12pm
Oh, and
hyphen -
en dash –
em dash —
Bwaaaahahahhahahahahah
by bwakfat on Sun, 05/08/2011 - 4:15pm
Tilde ~
(A personal favorite.)
by wabby on Sun, 05/08/2011 - 4:23pm
I'm partial to the ümlaut.
by bwakfat on Sun, 05/08/2011 - 4:40pm