Spelling Errors that the Spell Checkers Won't Pick Up

I have often seen words mis-spelled as other words which have a totally different meaning. Because the mis-spelled word is itself a real word, the spell-checkers don't pick them up as a mistake. Don't forget that spell-checkers are just that - they check the spelling of your words. They are not proof-readers.

Lose/Loose I've lost count of the number of articles, sales pages etc., that I have read which say something like If you don't do XYZ, you are loosing money. They should of course say If you don't do XYZ, you are losing money.

Loose : Not tight
Lose : To no longer have something because you do not know where it is, or because it has been taken away from you

There/Their/They're. This is one that so many people have difficulty with.

There : (to, at or in) that place. Put it over there.
Their : Possessive. Belonging to somebody. They hung their coats up.
They're : Abbreviation of "They are". They're coming here tomorrow.

Apostrophes

Apostrophes are used for two purposes only; to form contractions or abbreviations of words, and to indicate possession.

Contractions: Whenever one or more letters are omitted from a word, they are replaced by an apostrophe. Do not is often contracted to Don't. The apostrophe goes where the o would have been. Apostrophes are not used where a space is omitted. An example of a word with multiple apostrophes is fo'c'sle, or more correctly, fo'c'stle. This is a maritime word meaning fore castle. The apostrophes represent re and a respectively.

Possession: To indicate that something belongs to somebody, use an apostrophe followed by an s, like this: That house belongs to Fred can be written as That is Fred's house. Fred's house is in effect a contraction of the words Fred, his house. It's really that simple.

There are exceptions to this rule. If the name of the person already ends with s, simply place the apostrophe after the name and don't add the final s. So the car belonging to James is written as James' car. Similarly, when you are referring to items belonging to more than one person, the apostrophe goes at the end. I like to read other peoples' blogs. This sentence refers to the blogs of more than one person, so the apostrophe goes at the end of peoples.

Its/It's
This confuses people because they have learned that apostrophes are used to indicate possession (see above). In this instance the apostrophe is used to indicate omitted letters. It's is a contraction of the words It is. When you want to write its or it's, just stop and think whether your sentence would make sense if you changed it's to it is. For example: The dog buried it's bone in the garden is clearly incorrect because The dog buried it is bone in the garden does not make sense. Therefore, the correct word is its.

Use of Adjectives as Adverbs

Adjectives are words that describe a noun. For example furry as in I just saw a small, furry animal.
Adverbs are words that describe verbs (actions). For example quickly as in The car was going very quickly. In this example quickly is describing how the car was going, and going is the verb. Saying The car was going very quick is incorrect, because quick is an adjective and should not be used to describe a verb.

It is often very easy to turn an adjective into an adverb, simply by adding ly to the end of the word, thus: quick - quickly, poor - poorly.

Misused Words

Comprise. Do not use "is comprised of". The correct usage of "comprise" is as in this example: The system comprises three networked computers. The common misuse is to write this as The system is comprised of three networked computers.

Alternate/Alternative. This is an Americanism that is finding its way into British English. Alternate means to occur in a successive manner: "day alternating with night". Alternative means the choice between two possibilities: "an alternative way of doing something"

Affect/Effect. Affect is a verb which means to influence or change something. Effect is a noun which is the result of a preceding action. Effect can also be used as a verb meaning to bring about.

i.e./e.g. Simply put, "i.e" means "that is" or "that is to say", "e.g." means "for example".

etc./ect. "Etc" is an abbreviation of the Latin words "Et cetera". Take the first 3 letters, "etc". "Ect" is meaningless.