Phin of Phin's Blog brings up a touchy subject in the world of blogging netiquette:

Another thing is a grammatical or spelling issue that may have been overlooked by spell check, but may lead to ridicule. It personally doesnÂ’t bother me when someone points out a spelling / grammar error in the comments section. IÂ’ll typically correct it, thank the person and admit IÂ’m a knuckle head. However with some people IÂ’ve noticed they view comments pointing out their mistakes as a cardinal sin. How dare you go to their site and critique their writing in the comments (even though they make the change in their post)[...]

Should you e-mail someone tips / pointers on changes they could make for their blog to be more readable?
Is it acceptable to point out their error in a playful manner?
Should you simply e-mail them and hope they read it in a timely manner?

The tragic truth of blogging is that when you point out a mistake in someone's blog post, you will embarrass them to some degree. After all, they wouldn't have hit "publish" unless they thought their work was ready for the world to see. Therefore it's always best to e-mail the blogger privately to indicate that you only want to help.

However, there are times when you're in a hurry, or don't have access to your e-mail, or maybe you simply can't find the blogger's e-mail address. In that case, pointing it out in the comments is fine, but realize that you're now embarrassing them in public. This is ok if you have a relationship with the blogger where a little rib-poking is accepted and/or expected. But what if you're just a lurker or an occasional commenter? How can you ensure that the blogger doesn't think you're some sort of troll who's just trying to go "HA-HA! You're an idiot!"?

The best way to do that is to phrase the comment to allow for the possibility that you, the commenter, are wrong. For example:

"This is probably a really dumb question, but did you intend to put "[description of error]", or was that just a typo?"

The appearance of honest confusion on the part of a reader in never offensive, and it gives the blogger a chance to magnanimously rescue YOU from YOUR embarrassing admission of dumbness, which offsets most of the blogger's embarrassment over having a mistake pointed out publicly.

Personally, I assume ANY harshly critical comment from a stranger is based on a misunderstanding, and I'll normally give at least one good shot at trying to clear things up based on that assumption. I had to do quite a bit of that when I first started group-blogging at IMAO. Over there it turned out that - while not gently phrased - the criticism was well-intended, and even well-founded. I don't think I won any converts, but at least they're not out trying to deliberately tear me down anymore, either.

However, some bloggers - especially the larger ones - deal with rude, hateful trolls all the time. As a commenter, you should be both aware and understanding of that, and put a little extra effort and courtesy into your words so as to leave no doubt that your intentions are honorable.

Bend over backwards to be polite, and you'll never go wrong.

[If you've found this post useful enough to blog about, send a trackback or e-mail the permalink to me at harvolson-at-gmail.com and I'll add you to my Bad Example Groupies blogroll. See this post for details]

Posted by: Harvey at 08:50 PM | Comments (18) | Add Comment
Post contains 562 words, total size 4 kb.

1 Unless someone has a link that is incorrect, I never comment on someone's writing. I never tell them about spelling, grammatical or punctuation. I'm not perfect, so I don't point out others' mistakes. That said, my Dad will sometimes e-mail me and say, "Yo, you meant 'site' not 'sight'" and that's cool. He's my Dad. It's usually an oversight when I make a mistake like that, but sometimes... hey, I'm so far from perfect, it's not funny. Link mistakes, however, like my big link mistake for last carnival of the recipes e-mail address, I was really happy when Caltechgirl caught it and put it my comments. It was a quick way to get my attention and correcting my link mistakes NEVER offends me. Just my 2 cents.

Posted by: Boudicca at May 24, 2005 09:00 PM (z7nbM)

2 My first thought when someone corrects me is, "Oh shit, do they think I'm an idiot?" Even though the correction is meant out of kindness. I seem to a remember a time when I wrote something about my instructor in school misspelling calendar and I misspelled something in my post. You gave me a lot of traffic from that by posting it on your blog! :-) Great rib-poking fun!

Posted by: Sissy at May 24, 2005 09:12 PM (uXS+O)

3 Oh, I remember that, Sissy! That was funny. Harvey made it a contest to see who could find it.

Posted by: Boudicca at May 24, 2005 09:22 PM (z7nbM)

4 Harvey, I think you just happen to LIKE bending over backwards...

Posted by: Ogre at May 25, 2005 05:51 AM (/k+l4)

5 It's safer than bending over forwards :-)

Posted by: Harvey at May 25, 2005 06:42 AM (ubhj8)

6 ba ZING!

Posted by: Patriot Xeno at May 25, 2005 07:19 AM (z4SP5)

7 I don't point out others mistakes in general. I make them and I know others do to, so I figure it all balances out. I don't mind if someone tells me I made a mistake, but that also doesn't meant I'm going to fix it either. My spelling, grammer and punctuation is pretty bad. If it wasn't for spell check my blog would be done phonetically

Posted by: Contagion at May 25, 2005 07:20 AM (Q5WxB)

8 Ironically? "The appearance of honest confusion on the part of a reader in never offensive"

Posted by: Machelle at May 25, 2005 07:39 AM (ZAyoW)

9 Crap! I think I'll leave that one in, because there's a corrollary to Murphy's Law that states that any post about typographical errors will contain at least one typographical error. Good eye :-)

Posted by: Harvey at May 25, 2005 07:51 AM (ubhj8)

10 I never learned to spell. I have been told it can be attributed to fact that I read too quickly--I never learned to "break down and sound out" words, so their component parts just appear to my brain as a whole entity. This is why I keep a dictionary to hand at all times. However, unless a word looks funny to me, like "corrollary", I don't look it up....

Posted by: Susie at May 25, 2005 09:57 AM (V1YvO)

11 Anyone who blogs makes more than their share of mistakes with spelling and grammar. Unless, the mistake changes the meaning they're trying to convey... I generally don't worry about it. I have even done previews... only to hit "post" on a comment and THEN see a mistake... sheesh! AND I have a spell checker for Firefox which I use and I've STILL had misspellings - it just happens. As Bou says "site" and "sight" will both pass the spell checker without a problem.

Posted by: Teresa at May 25, 2005 12:05 PM (nAfYo)

12 Susie - What's the matter? Not enough r's for you? Fine: corrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrollary :-P

Posted by: Harvey at May 25, 2005 12:51 PM (tJfh1)

13 Someone should tell phin that "knucklehead" is one word, not two... *ducking*

Posted by: Ponytailed Conservative at May 25, 2005 03:41 PM (rqTv2)

14 I actually corrected phin in the comments on that post so he would call himself a knucklehead. I'm mean like that. I misspell stuff all the time too. And we never take off points for grammatical errors at my blog.

Posted by: Two Dogs at May 25, 2005 05:02 PM (xbqo4)

15 One blogger that I regularly read, had gone into a bit of a tirade on a post about bad spelling, grammar, and how people should know better and proof their posts. Then in his very next post, he mis-used there/their. I asked him if that was how they spelled it in Texas. He blustered back and said of course it is, yada yada yada. I checked back a couple hours later and he had found the error. He commented, "I'll bet that felt good, didn't it?" Well, under the circumstances, yes. However, I type many posts in a rush between here and there, I try to proof them, but you can invariably catch something from each day. Feel free to comment. I don't mind!

Posted by: JulieB at May 25, 2005 06:38 PM (+C/+o)

16 I don't mind the occasional incorrect spelling, grammar, etc. What drives me nuts are people who can barely form a coherant sentence. Granted, you find that in comments more than blog posts, but still... As for blog posts, you should hound those people without mercy for incorrect spelling, unless it's me, then you should update your spellchecker to reflect my genius because that's obviously how the word was MEANT to be spelled... (Grau ducks from random spoiled produce tossed his direction)

Posted by: Graumagus at May 25, 2005 07:44 PM (1LZ5i)

17 I luv ya, Harv! ;P

Posted by: Susie at May 25, 2005 10:40 PM (V1YvO)

18 Close your fucking cake hole... you misspelling dickhead!

Posted by: Madfish Willie at May 28, 2005 04:21 PM (K37HC)

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