Typo alert

What is the typographical error?

A typographical error, or typo, is a mistake made during typing which is usually caused by a slip of the hand or subconscious mis-typing (usually resulting in a typed homophone). Typos are typically missing, additional or transposed characters and are not simply ignorant mis-spellings.

Typos and the translator

You will expect a professional translator to recognise typo errors in a source text and not replicate these in a translation but can you be sure that a translator will not introduce their own typos? A spellcheck is not infallible. A translator will often let their translation sit awhile before returning to proofread. Sometimes, no matter how skilled the translator, neither method is good enough. A final proofread by a second translator who can look upon the text with a fresh pair of eyes is required to produce an error-free piece of work.

Media

Typos in the media and in official documentation are highly scorned. A typo can, of course, completely negate the effectiveness of an advert, officialdom or what is intended to be high-brow content. To this day, the Guardian newspaper is trying to live down its ‘Grauniad’ label born of frequent typesetting errors.

The Internet

The Internet is a minefield for typos, both on professionally produced websites and as a result of people’s desire to post comments and blog. This is where typos really come into a class of their own as people make the most of the web community and can be as creative as they wish and flout standardised grammar and usage, to the extent that an Internet-specific slang has spawned. Typos are frequently used intentionally (often as ridicule of usage).

This intentional mis-typing is not the same as Leet or Leetspeak Internet slang where a letter, or letters, in a word is substituted by other characters, letters or otherwise, in order to make the word harder to interpret. However, common usage of mis-spellings and mis-typings such as ‘teh’ and ‘z’ instead of ‘s’ at the end of words is derived from Leet.

A new concept making the most of the popularity of online auction sites and the frequency of typos on the Internet are specific web sites which allow people to search for mis-spelled auction entries and thereby find items that have been incorrectly listed by title or description and are therefore usually untraceable by regular search methods.

Another cunning exploitation of the typo is by the typo-squatter. Keyboard mis-strikes by Internet users when searching for popular websites mean that they often inadvertently enter a slightly mis-spelt web address. This will take them to a site where someone has registered the domain name specifically in order to benefit from accidental traffic.