How important is grammar while writing a blog?
Or is it the thought that counts?
Of coorse the content is impotent, but I;m constently surprised at how many blogs contane grammatical and speling errors. With the thousands of blog out their, every blog owner should ensure there content is well writen as some people can;t get past the basic errors to absorb the intended thoguhts
I'm sure it was well intended :)
@ The NRI
So true. This is what I was trying to gather as a point. Most bloggers here have absolutely zero regard for grammar or any syntax in their blog. Most blogs seem to be an amalagamation of boredom and 'thesaurus.com'. And I don't mean it in a typographical error sort of a way...
Some blogs resonate Yahoo chat windows of the early 2000s. Even the current Indiblogger contest winner has such blatant inconsistencies in his blog, it's not even funny.
Most of these 'winners' have managed to form a coalition with similiar mediocre bloggers who vote for them (The philosophy being: "I scratch your back and you scratch mine.") Winning a contest here is solely based on contacts.
And content and grammatical sense go hand in hand - you cannot have one without the other.
Or maybe you can... You just need to 'get by with a little help from your friends'...
@Utsav - If you're a regular, then you should focus on correct English as readers really get irked when they notice a grammatical mistake.
It also depends on how do you want to position your blog, i.e. what do you want your readers to think of your blog. If it's something light, humor, jokes then one or two mistake can be absorbed casually but if it's a review, product blog, poems, etc then there should be no grammatical mistake.
But then, there are exceptions and it's only you who has to define it! Read what Shahrukh Khan tweeted on his spelling mistakes:
"spellings dont matter as long as the meaning is clear friends. if u get caught up in spellings most certainly u will never find the essence. - @iamsrk, April 29
Hope this helps you to arrive at some conclusion! :)
@ Arif
Good thought but - CELEBS DON'T COUNT AS REAL PEOPLE! SRK left aside, Shahid Kapoor's tweets are what textual nightmares are made of. And he's not the only one.
Because of their celebrity status, people will follow them, even revere their tweets no matter how badly they're written.
And grammatically or semantically incorrect blogs are so frickin' annoying. You'd want to wring their necks first and read their blogs later. And I'm not even counting the SMS lingo buggers.
@Utsav - You've picked up the exception I have quoted. I have clearly expressed in the first two lines that grammatically correct English is desirable.
Its downright painful to read grammatically incorrect blogs.i hAte pPl hu ryt Lyk dis.
Very true. Now where's Addy when you need him? :P
the sms text is big turn off for me..
There are different kinds of grammatically annoying (Yes, not just incorrect) blogs...
They include:
1. The Dotbusters: They once won a lottery of full-stops (and question marks). They still keep showing off their wealth.
Example: "hi...................this is a nice blog.................................................it is so nice to see such cool blogs.................................i left my dog for my blog.................................you DON'T BELIEVE ME????????????????????????????????????? but it's true.............................................................................................................................................."
Yes. Annoying as... er, fornication.
2. The Emphasizers: They have a very, very wrong idea about what emphasis is. If they want to emphasize of a word, say, 'change' - They'll go "changeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee". Because that does not get pronounced as 'changy'. Because 'changy' is a real word.
"I dnt care hu u r........dnt eva chngeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
Yes. Emphasis is beautiful.
3. The Rollercoasters: tHeY liKE tO cApiTaLiZe aT rAnDom.
'Nuff said.
4. The Soulful Thesaurus: Under the melancholic guise of thoughtful serenity, these followers of Goethe's wretched offspring, tend to have a sublime yet grotesque way of becoming an artefact of the wrong trajectory of impudence. Did the protagonist say Goethe? His mind's answer was Goatse.
See what I mean. These bloggers get away with complete BS just because people are stupid enough to think of the confused paraphrasing as brilliant writing.
I'll think of more and reprt back here... :)
Utsav, tears are rolling down my cheek!
You should work on this to create a fuller blog post and publish on Indivine. I would vote for you.
Alright, am on it. :)
Its not like I judge people with a bad grammar or anything. I just really REALLY despise people who try WAY too much. (yes, the ones in the fourth category).You don't know English? THATS FINE!Not the end of the World! Heck!The best poets in the world have no friggin' hold on their grammar!(Have you read Blake? If I were his High School Teacher I would strike through with a red pen and write Bad Grammar all over). So stop trying so hard eh?
And yes Utsav, I'm all eyes for this being a blog post!
I'm working on the photoshop as we speak - should be up in a day or two... :)
Utsav, I chcked ur profil nd saw u only got a crappy Indirank of 46. U thnk ur so clvr with all ur gramar and speling bt where does it get u!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
U need to write in a way ppl can relate 2 if you want higher score.
Think twice b4 putting ne thing on Indivine. Ur last post only got 3 votes an that was probly u voting for urself, riiiiiiiiiiiggghhtt???????????
Er, what?
How many of you are there? :P
I started my blog this January and my network was exactly one blog before I joined Indiblogger. So I'm not not huge on the PR quotient. And frankly, if I were to feel bad about the lack of love on my Indivine posts... It wouldn't make any real sense. The most highly rated blogs have the crappiest undertaking of issues/ style of writing. They're just rated high because people in huge numbers... are idiots. Peer pressure to vote on an article is much more than the deservingness of the article to the be voted. It's like the political system - the honest, hard-hitting independent candidate is never chosen. :P
But things have changed recently, I've been getting hits the likes of 350 plus some days. Call me elitist, but I don't want riff-raffs looking at my blog. :) I don't need people to relate to me. Those who enjoy it, will keep on reading it and I'm going to serve them with better fare everytime.
But on a lighter note, why the sudden change of stance in the style of writing. And pleease tell me, how one can vote for him/herself on Indivine? :)
I think grammar is really important when it comes to writing. Atleast an attempt should be made to correct grammar as far as possible when it comes to writing, I believe that blogspot or whatever space it is that you're alloted on the internet should be considered as a privelege rather than a right. Posted something on similiar lines on my blog. Here's the link
Brilliantly well put. :)
Utsav, I have become a fan of your blog since you posted this thread. My last comment was a humorous take on the inconsistency of a great blog getting a poor ranking and few votes. Of course it's nothing new and most of my favourite blogs on this site don't seem to get the recognition they deserve. I pay no attention to Indirank and have said as much on previous threads. So don't try to justify your low rank, it should be a badge of honour. I am desperately trying to lower mine to increase my credibility as a blogger!
Anyway, you are hopefully creating a new legion of fans with this post. The days of voting for your own posts will soon be over - still racking my brains to work out how you do this:)
Happy blogging!
@ The NRI
Respect!
Hi Utsav,
Congratulations! for being a blogger-with-balls...You raise issues which lot of us (including me) wouldn't even dare discuss on a public forum..
Now, adding fuel to the fire - It has to be good grammar in blogs, no matter which category you fall into. I am surprised when people say personal category should be let off. Why? If I am reading what someone else has written, it has to properly written. Be it a pro or a novice, expecting quality langauge is not a crime. Bad grammar would have a toll on your readership or not - difficult to say, as lot of people are tolerant to mistakes and errors.
The best practice of blogging suggests us to proofread atleast once before posting unless you want to get embarrassed by your readers posting comments on your mistakes.
Being in the profession of writing and composing documents, I know it is hard to find your own mistakes. I used to make errors (still do) but I have some reviewer at my disposal. Blogging is a personal affair. Here, the job of the blogger doubles up to writing and reviewing. So, if you are a long term player, do not run away from the fact that you need to learn to edit effectively as well. To supplement, you do have the proofread feature in wordpress and I know there are lot of software which make sure you write error-free wherever you write, in blogs, in web forms or on any blank white space on internet.
Accepting mistakes is the most humbling experience and bloggers should edit their posts, as and when they come across/find out the error.
No one is perfect. But nothing stops us in striving to become one.
Cheers,Sachin
P.S. I know lot of you have seen this one. But, it effectively sums up the point everyones trying to make:
A panda walks into a café. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and proceeds to fire it at the other patrons.
'Why?' asks the confused, surviving waiter amidst the carnage, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.
'Well, I'm a panda,' he says, at the door. 'Look it up.'
The waiter turns to the relevant entry in the manual and, sure enough, finds an explanation. 'Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots, and leaves.'
P.P.S. Do read a book called "Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation by Lynne Truss on how to use punctuations properly. Nice, fun read!
Grammar matters.
You must pretend that you are the boss,to your viewers.
And obviously,it can be achieved only through good grammar. 
it depends on how well you want to communicate with the readers.
I always used to feel that my grammar is not so good enough to write in English. But, I got a lot to reveal to this world and I think beyond grammar we should give importance to the content. All I used to ask my friends about my blog whenever I publish a post is "Is it really understandable?". I always used to give special care about grammar so that I used to copy the post in microsoft word to find some basic grammatical errors. I do not have a good reading habit and I perfectly know that I am still adjusting with my available english vocabulary. But, I always used to hear that my language is lucid and effective and it is the only reason for my new blog posts! In my view, I always liked to appreciate efforts than skills. I'm trying a little hard to write and appreciate if I deserve something. I will not convince anyone to read my blog but, no one should say that they didn't knew that my blog really exists.
Please don't stop writing if you believe you got something to reveal to this world.A blog is a perfect platform for it. Just make sure that you will reach to your own levels or standards. I deleted some of my old posts because I felt so ashamed of posting such an irrelevant low quality literature in my blog. It is a change and this is just how I inspire myself to write new posts. Ignorance can be a mistake but, it is not always a mistake!
I thank Utsav for bringing a relevant subject here.
Raghu
I firmly agree with all those who say that grammer is very essential while writing a blog post. Well it's not just about a blog post but about any content writing activity; wherein the grammer and the spelling should be immaculate.
A post or article with poor grammer or several spelling mistakes is a big turnoff for readers. A tiny error here and there can be excused as a "typo" but there has to be a limit to it.
It differs from reader to reader. Most of the readers are generous enough to encourage blogging and writing(the case with mostly if the reader is a blogger too :D). However, there are always people who find their own means to have fun.
I feel that a blogger should write out his/her thought in fairly simple and understandable way.
That works.
Cheers!
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