Interro-what?

In the early 1960s advertising executive and magazine editor Martin K. Speckter invented what he had hoped would be the punctuation mark to end all exclamatory rhetorical questions; the interrobang. 

The interrobang combines the exclamation point and the question mark: 

? + ! = ‽

Dictonary.com defines the interrobang as

in·ter·ro·bang

  [in-ter-uh-bang] 

–noun

a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces,designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamationpoint (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after arhetorical question.

Origin: 

1965–70, Americanism ; interro(gation point)  + bang¹ ,  printers'slang for an exclamation point

Since its invention the interrobang has been reduced to that as a fad and been replaced simply by the punctuation marks that make it (?!).

Who knew?  

Would it kill you to use some punctuation?

Rarely will I participate in online forums or make a comment in an alloted section because I don't care enough to spend my time on doing so. I do however like to read the comments left by others. 


On one of my daily ventures to perezhilton.com I came across a blog post about a journalism student and her quest to get some information from Apple CEO Steve Jobs. 


From what I can tell, the aspiring journalist had an assignment due and had tried to contact Apple's media relations department to no avail. She then took it upon herself to go to the top. 


The story was picked up by Good Morning America (GMA) and can be seen here.


The GMA story neglects to tell how long the student had to write the article and whether or not she tried a different means (phone calls?) to get ahold of the media relations department. 


Now whichever side of the argument you find yourself on (assuming you have watched the video) all I ask if you're going to make a comment, like poster mariosfat, please take the time to use some grammar: 




"what a loser bitch asking for a note get to work u lazy fat pig"

Is music the exception?

Song lyrics can be a notorious breeding ground of poor grammar. Take for instance Every Little Thing She Does is Magic by the Police from the album Synchronicity. 


Sting sings:


"Every little thing she does is magic, everything she do just turns me on"


Such a glaring error is like listening to nails on a chalkboard or worse, the sound of someone eating a banana in a quiet room. 


But are the grammatical errors that pop up in music the same as ones that pop up in  written word? 


Even AC/DC has blatant disregard for grammar in the song Let There be Rock from Back in Black:


"Let there be drums, and there was drums"  


With that said, is it ok for musicians to use their artistic license to butcher the English language? Contributers on the site www.amiright.com don't seem to think so. 


Bands from Aerosmith to Black Sabbath, from Nancy Sinatra to Cypress Hill have errors in their lyrics but who am I to argue with millions of album sales. 

You have poor grammar, i.e., you don't know what you're doing...

There is nothing worse (note the exaggeration) than blatant misuse of the English language. 


When someone writes "your" but really means "you're" makes me cringe. I equate it to an adult who can't properly use a knife and fork. 


Imagine my surprise when a friend who often writes "then" when she really means "than" pointed out my improper use of the Latin abbreviations i.e. and e.g.. 


I.e. or id est means that is (to say) while e.g. or exempli gratia means for example. 


Thankfully theoatmeal.com has taught me never to misuse these abbreviations ever again: 

Lesson learned.