In 2001, researchers studied how background music affected the quality of people’s writing. The findings showed that “background music significantly disrupted writing fluency” — a fairly cut-and-dry
Apple’s dashboard comes with a great dictionary/thesaurus. It’s intuitive. It’s easy to access. And for an offline tool, it’s impressively comprehensive. We use it all the time and, until this
Your client hands you a 50-page manual explaining the scope of the latest artificial intelligence software they came up with. It was written by the engineer who created it. Now you have to share that with
Next time you read a body of text, pay closer attention to what’s actually being said. More than likely, you’ll notice some terms and expressions that are used in ways that don’t quite fit when you
Contrary to popular belief, speaking two languages doesn’t make you a translator. Sure, you could get the main point across and in doing so get what you want. But that logic doesn’t apply to written
We’ve made it clear on multiple occasions that the English language is full of rules with little logic and lots of exceptions. Isn’t that a lovely combination? There are so many experts out there whose
As promised, we’ve compiled a new crop of editing nightmares for those who share the frustration. These cringe-inducing habits are the literary equivalent of socks and sandals. Seeing them can render
What? You mean to say that my friend who taught fifth-grade English once isn’t qualified to edit my entrance essay to an Ivy League school? Right. And neither is your friend who taught ESL abroad for
If you’ve edited anything for an extended period of time, you’ll understand how infuriating the tiniest mistakes can be. You’ll also know that intense feeling of wanting to flip a table, punch a
It’s not uncommon to see double negatives in writing. Now, wouldn’t that have read better if we said it’s common instead? All too often, people like to state things in their negative forms. But why?
