As a copy editor and therefore grammar nut, I’m especially attuned to errors of grammar, spelling and punctuation. But I realize not everyone can be as prefect as me when it comes to proofreadign, so I’m willing to cut them some slack.
Crocs.ca, for example, the website of those awful-looking plastic shoes that everyone seems to love. I can forgive their awkwardly-phrased taglines like “men: that’s all you need!” or “lifestyle: every day with style” or “work: even at work!”
I can forgive their aversion to the use of capital letters, their tenuous grasp on the rules of proper hyphenation and their missing commas.
I can forgive small mistakes like neglecting to superscript the “TM” that comes after their trademark.
I might even, on a good day, forgive an accidental misspelling of one’s own trademark.
But when your business is creating “comfortable” shoes and you misspell “comfort” multiple times in prominent places right next to the correct spelling, that’s just unforgiveable.
I don’t know what world these people live in, but translation isn’t something companies should hire amateurs to do.
UPDATE: I just checked the website’s terms of use, which apparently doesn’t allow me to link to it:
you may not create links from other websites to this website, except if expressly permitted by the site owner. (to obtain permission, contact our website administrator at support@crocs.ca.)
Just for kicks, I’ve gone ahead and asked permission. I’ll let you know what their response is. The email was rejected by the server because support@crocs.ca doesn’t exist.
But I realize not everyone can be as prefect as me when it comes to proofreadign
You’re so cute.
my first impulse was to denounce the crocs.ca as a poorly-executed spam site. Princess Iveylocks often has to stare at those for work, committing vaguely-off details to memory for future reference. But no, crocs.com links to crocs. ca. Huh.
…why are you so interested in Crocs, anyway?
I’m not. A friend tipped me off to this one.
hmmm
They apparently need tech support and a copy editor. I vote you offer your services.
I’m constantly amazed that these companies will spend so much money to make a flyer, but not even have one anglo look it over. The worst (or best if you laugh at it like I do) is for the car company 7 jours direct. Their flyer is hilarious in English. Teinted windows is one of my faves.
Their restriction on linking to them is at once ridiculous, unenforceable and counterproductive to the very nature of the WWW. How silly can you get???
I also like how you link to their site anyway, by way of their Terms of Use page… ;-)