More Twittering

Glad to find more company in confusion. Thanks to Judy Gombita for pointing me to a copywriter in tech PR, the blogger behind The Friendly Ghost, who asks, “What is Twitter for, exactly?” He speculates it’s a form of micro-blogging, which I can see...

Going through the wringer

What happens when a phrase references old technology? It becomes a prime candidate for being misspelled. I thought of this when spotting “put us through the ringer” in my local newspaper. The word should be spelled “wringer,” as in the old...

New words for two dictionaries

Talk about a never-ending job! Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Eleventh Edition) recently added some new words, chosen among submissions from readers for their favourite word not in the dictionary. Sadly, one of the top choices was...

Whatever happened to longevity?

While catching up on my reading after being away, I ran across an interesting article in Saturday’s Toronto Star. In “The tyranny of residual media,” freelance writer Ryan Bigge talks about the iPhone and how consumers chase the new and improved. As...

Creative quoting

My preferred method of getting a comment from someone to include in an article for an employee publication is to actually talk to the person and get the comment straight from him/her. (I know, what a concept!) As with writing a speech for another person, it’s...