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Sorry! Sorry! Sorry! Wrong email!
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2007 12:37
AM
Subject: Re: the grammar of photographic
writers
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, October 13, 2007 3:05
PM
Subject: the grammar of photographic
writers
I'm very bad at plurals... In my first language there is
no
article and nouns have no plural form. In writing
patent
applications, phrases such as "one or more of," "any
number
of," and "a plural of" are more useful because being
specific
without showing any detail is an important part of the
game.
However, the spam quoted below reminds me of
unnecessary
capitalization. This is actually a very common mistake
among
writers of photographic processes. Some people
unnecessarily
capitalize names of elements and compounds, e.g.,
Silver
Nitrate and Hydroquinone (these should not be capitalized).
On
the other hand, some people fail to capitalize, e.g.,
metol,
phenidone and dimezone (these should be capitalized as they
are
trade names).
Use of italics and hyphenation adds up to the issue.
In
typesettnig N-methyl-p-aminophenol (Metol), N (always in
capital as
it referrs to the nitrogen atom in the amino group)
and p should be
italicized but not the rest. Unnecessary
hyphenation such as
N-methyl-p-amino-phenol looks funny, but
things like tri-ethanol-amine
look crazy, and worse
unnecessary hyphens are inserted in wrong places,
like
benzo-tria-zole (when benzotriazole is benzo + tri + azole).
Then
use of inappropriate acronyms... BTA is the acronym for
benzotriazole in
photographic chemistry but some people
(non-chemists) used
BTZ.
When typesetting pH, the p should be italicized in lower
case
and H should be always roman capital, as it referrs to
hyrdogen.
Same thing for pAg, pBr, etc.
Then there's confusion of words and
concepts... e.g., absorb
v. adsorb.
Then there's a long list of
misnomers that should be fixed and
historical artifacts that should be
modernized (or modernized
form should be mentioned at least).
But
I guess the biggest problem is high frequency of wrong
statements. Many
photographic pages on Wikipedia contain
serious errors in addition to the
above problems (and I
occasionally contribute my edits only to realize
someone else
adds more errors). Articles/websites written by
non-experts
suffer from the same.
And I still want to know what
the "Prestigious non-accredited
Universities" refer
to.
From: Judy Seigel <jseigel@panix.com>
Subject: Re:
the grammar of spam
Date: Mon, 08 Oct 2007 22:36:57 -0400
(EDT)
> Before I comment on Don's comment, I share some spam
arrived in my inbox tonight:
>
> The sender was listed as
"Cornell," I suppose to imply or associate with Cornell University. The
message began, "Here's how much you can expect to earn in your life with the
following degrees:"
>
> High School Diploma:
$1,100,000
> Bachelor's Degree: $2,100,000
>
Master's Degree: $2,500,000
>
Doctorate:
$4,400,000
>
> You Need a Better Degree, and we can
Help!
> Obtain degrees from Prestigious non-accredited
>
Universities based on you life experience.
> NO ONE is turned
down.
> Call Now 7 days a week.
--
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Checked by AVG Free
Edition.
Version: 7.5.488 / Virus Database: 269.14.8/1063 - Release Date:
10/11/2007 9:11 AM
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