Newsday.com Bungles Headline With Unnecessary Apostrophe

Newsday.com has made mistakes in the past and is likely to make mistakes in the future, but the Proofreader will probably not know about these future mistakes. That is, unless sharp-eyed readers inform him of the blunders. Why? Newsday.com recently placed its content behind a pay wall and there's no way the Proofreader will be shelling out money to see repeated copy errors committed by professional editors.

So, how'd he get this one?

A careful reader sent it to the Proofreader, that's how. Also, it's from September 2nd, well before the pay wall was initiated. The reader, who asked to remain anonymous, wrote in an e-mail message, "Newsday.com made a nice apostrophe screw-up in an article about the Mets; I figured you'd enjoy it. They've since fixed the error, but not before I got a screen capture of it!  Enjoy."

Enjoy (mocking it) we shall, anonymous reader. Notice the unnecessary apostrophe highlighted in the screen shot above. We've seen this type of slipshod proofreading before from the editorial staff over at Newsday.com. The question is: Will we ever see it again?

Ever see copy mistakes that never should've been made? Take a screen shot and e-mail it to the Proofreader.

The Proofreader thanks the Anonymous Reader for submitting the mistake. 

Affect or Effect Conundrum

Today's post about the affect/effect conundrum is a result of a reader submission. Stan Kost e-mailed the Proofreader inquiring about a questionable word choice in an A.P. story on Alaska's frequently erupting Mount Redoubt that he saw recently on Yahoo! News. Mr. Kost wrote, "This Yahoo! News story used 'affects' as a noun. Shouldn't it be 'effects'? Or is it a legitimate alternate spelling?"

No, when used as nouns affect and effect are not interchangeable. When to use affect or effect is a dilemma that's stymied many a deadline-driven writer, because the affect/effect rules are really hard to remember, even for pro writers--maybe because they don't lend well to a catchy mnemonic device. Referring to a style guide, such as The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage, would swiftly resolve the matter, but sometimes writers don't have time or forget to check. Hence the existence of copy editors and proofreaders who should catch these kinds of subtle mistakes most people never even notice.

As you can see, highlighted in the above screen shot, the last sentence of graph twelve reads, "She was experiencing other affects, too." Interestingly, in the preceding paragraph, the word "affect" is used correctly--as a verb meaning "to influence or change," according to page 10 of the Times style manual. An argument can be made that affects is the correct word choice in the above sentence because it's being used as a noun meaning "an emotional response or feeling," as is noted on page 11 of the Times style manual. It's plausible somebody living next to an eruption-happy volcano could be experiencing feelings of fright or concern. But the very next line of the article shoots a bunch of holes in that theory:

The woman quoted here explains the effects (not affects) or physical "results or consequences" the volcanic ash in the air had on her eyes. Affect/effect confusion is a common problem and this is a subtle mistake that only the most alert readers catch, but it's certainly a mistake that should've been caught by someone at the A.P. or Yahoo! News.

The Proofreader thanks Stan Kost for submitting the mistake.

Unnecessary Apostrophe In Fishbowl NY Posting

Let's take a brief hiatus from Misspelling Blagojevich Week to turn our attention to an unnecessary apostrophe that appeared in a post on the prominent media blog Fishbowl NY. It's not as wicked a scene as Sodom and Gomorrah burning, so you won't turn into a pillar of salt after looking at it, but the blunder does kind of sting the pupils.

In a post dated January 14th, an attempt at the word "lots" was made, but, instead, a possessive form of the Biblical character Lot is what readers got. "Lot's, yeah, it's what we got, I said remember that!" Wait, those aren't the lyrics to that song.


Anyway, direct your attention to the third word of the post's fourth line in the screen shot above and you'll see the sloppy copy, highlighted for your viewing convenience, staring you in the face. This is most definitely a mistake that should never have been made.