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Browsing through Facebook, one must often sort through and endure a constant barrage of poor grammar and misspellings. Generally we accept this (or I do) as one of the pitfalls in our present digital age. Everything is instant, quantity is more important than quality, and getting a Like and a Share means a lot to some people.
But I expect more from the advertisements I’m forced to view than I do from the common man, especially when precision is part of the ad copy.
Look what I found today, when a GMC ad auto-played (an obnoxious feature for a different article) with captions, since I had my computer on mute.
See the problem? Someone at GMC’s ad company thinks the plural of conductor is conductor is. And they didn’t stop there.
Because the plural of maestro (which is not a proper noun) is Maestro is.
Now am I nitpicking? Possibly. But it matters a lot to people who rely solely on captions or the written word to receive information. I expect just a bit more precision from a company attempting to sell product on that virtue.
[Images captured via Facebook]
I’m fairly certain GMC has NO control over the closed captioning, but I suppose I could be mistaken…
You’re mistaken. This can be changed when uploading a video to Facebook and YouTube.
These commercials were made by idiots IMHO.
They use the word “exactness” in this, or a similar ad. The word is “exactitude.” I know exactness is kind of a word, but when did we just start adding the suffix “-ness” to make up words?
Jack nailed it when this campaign launched.
Eminence Front!
It’s a Put-On!
Thankfully TTAC has never had any grammar mistakes.
YES THANKFULLY YOUR ABSOLUTELY FREE CONTENT WITHOUT ANY COMMERCIAL BIAS HAS BEEN PERFECTLY SUITED FOR YOUR PERSONAL TASTES YOU UNGRATEFUL PIECE OF SH1T.
whoa dude
And when we make mistakes, people call them out and we fix them. Maybe GMC will do the same, but I doubt it.
As an aside, subtitles are a big deal for the deaf community. We do our best to help the blind community on TTAC (if there is one) by adding correct alt. text tags to images so they can at least have that image described to them by a computer.
So I called out the huge grammar mistake(s) in the Honda Odyssey “disclosure” statement last night and no one approved my comment. I like how the writer attempted to fix the mistake, yet it’s still incorrect. What a joke.
P.S. Corey–the plural of maestro does use an apostrophe because it’s a foreign word. Please don’t call out other people’s mistakes if you don’t know what you’re talking about!
For starters, I attempted to fix it earlier today based on your comment and I just went at it again now.
I didn’t approve your comment because you were being an arse. It’s one thing to point out a grammar flub. It’s another thing to be a massive dick about it like you’re doing right now.
So all foreign words, when plural, get an apostrophe.
pomme frite’s
haricot’s vert’s
baguette’s
No. The plural is maestros.
Indeed, that is a new bit of nonsense to me. Loan words must use an apostrophe in their plural form? I am completely taken aback.
I’m pretty sure sentences aren’t supposed to end with prepositions.
That is a rule up with which I will not put.
“the plural of maestro does use an apostrophe because it’s a foreign word. Please don’t call out other people’s mistakes if you don’t know what you’re talking about!”
Might I suggest you listen to your own advice?
Maestro:
Borrowing from Italian maestro, from Latin magister (“master”).
Pronunciation/ˈmaɪstɹoʊ/
Noun
maestro (plural maestros)
A master in some art, especially a composer or conductor.
Synonyms
master
Master, master, where’s the dreams that I’ve been after…
“the plural of maestro does use an apostrophe because it’s a foreign word.”
Who told you that was how English worked?
MS: “And when we make mistakes, people call them out and we fix them.”
You’re behind schedule. I pointed out your error in the article below eight days ago.
https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2017/05/volkswagen-crushes-10-speed-dual-clutch-dreams/
Thanks for pointing out about the benefit of closed-captioning for the deaf and hard-of-hearing communities.
People often forget that closed-captioning does benefit the hearing people as well.
Some hearing people have hearing disorders that interfere with their abilities to hear clearly, namely tinnitus, tone deafness, etc.
Closed-captioning helps the young children and illiterate people develop their reading skills by listening and reading at the same time (even though closed-captioning isn’t 100% accurate but better than none). Studies proved that hearing children of deaf adults have better reading comprehension a several grades above their peers.
The pubs and fitness clubs have several television sets, and it’s hard to hear the dialogues from them or know which one is talking. Closed-captioning solved that issue perfectly.
Sometimes the actors and actresses are hard to hear or understand because of mumblings, background noises, strong accents, or unfamilar pronouncations.
The people who learn foreign languages love them because they could listen to the pronouncations while reading the closed-captioning. Spanish-speaking people in the US often use closed-captioning to improve their English fluency as shown by National Captioning Institute’s survey in the 1980s.
As a guitarist of 30 years I can attest to the fact that ‘tone-deaf’ and actual hearing ailments do not belong in the same category.
All right, I should have said the mouthful ‘high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss’ if I want to be specific which type of tone deafness…
TTAC isn’t trying to sell me a $50k+ vehicle with claims of “precision” and “quality”.
that’s Facebook’s Automatic sub-titling. It’s not the work of GMC or their ad agency.
edit: YouTube’s is even worse, I found that ad and while it didn’t make the same error, it made a more amusing one:
“there are conductors and there are my strokes”
Shhh, don’t ruin an opportunity for more gratuitous GM bashing by TTAC!
Like I said, please let me know if you find any more ads with such issues, and I will gladly put them up here. And I’ll give you credit for the find!
Lead with Confidence…into the bottom 20% of the class.
As a bona fide degree-carrying English curriculum graduate, stuff like this drives me crazy but also provides a chuckle or two. The funny thing is, a good chunk of the population probably didn’t even notice. That said, Corey, I appreciate your attention to detail and sharing this with us. I’d like to add that you aren’t picking nits…this is absolutely a legitimate criticism you’ve leveled against GMC.
IT’S FACEBOOK’S AUTOMATIC SUBTITLING, NOT GMC!!!!
Fair point. Facebook should be held culpable too, but GMC is still responsible to police their own stuff. If they noticed, they should contact Facebook to get the issue rectified. I’m not letting them off that easy! :)
And they should notice, if anybody is paying attention.
You can edit that. Just because that’s what Facebook gives you by default does not mean you must use it.
“The GMC Arcadia. Always a 5th grade performance.”
There, fixed it for them.
Corey, it’s not nitpicking. It’s fair game. In comments and texting, typos and incorrect grammar are forgivable. When advertising — nay, performing — precision is expected and required.
State of Alabama temporary tag (license plate) when you first buy a car but you don’t yet have the permanent metal license plate:
“TAG APPLIED FOR”
No digits or anything else official looking. Sometimes these “tag applied for” tags are hand written on a random piece of paper or cardboard.
Irony is replacing the “TAG APPLIED FOR” paper with a “support education” specialty plate.
The registration paperwork is presumably inside the car, ready to present to any law enforcement official on request. The hand written thing (and I’ve seen some pretty rough examples) basically means that the “honor system” is de facto legal when it comes to registering and operating vehicles on public highways.
(Other strange Alabama motoring fact: big trucks with two trailers are allowed in any lane they please, including the left lane in places with three or more lanes.)
“(Other strange Alabama motoring fact: big trucks with two trailers are allowed in any lane they please, including the left lane in places with three or more lanes.)”
Domestic terrorism.
“(Other strange Alabama motoring fact: big trucks with two trailers are allowed in any lane they please, including the left lane in places with three or more lanes.)”
Q: Where does a 500lb gorilla sleep?
A: Anywhere he wants to.
Not that it really matters, but “Tag Applied For” is not required, nor is it valid in Alabama.
It’s a legacy of the old system where the tag was tied to the car and included when it was sold (used). So you would buy a new car and wait for weeks for the state to issue a new plate for it. New car owners or those bringing a car in from out of state needed something to indicate they were waiting for the state, thus the “Tag Applied For” signage.
The rental car companies still use them, I’ve had a couple of cars in the last year with plastic “Tag Applied For” plates. I assume the cars were purchased and trucked in from out of state, and that the issued plates would eventually catch up to the car.
Today the tag is held by the owner and transferred to the new vehicle, so you don’t normally need any temporary tag at all.
You have 10 days from the date of sale to register the vehicle, and you must keep a copy bill of sale in the car in case you are pulled over.
Most dealers use a pre-printed “Tag Applied For” or their own dealer logo tag on the car to make things easier for the purchaser until they receive the state issued tag.
If you chose a personalized tag, you receive a paper temporary tag until the metal plate is received.
Neat. I didn’t realize it was no longer valid- plenty of people seem to think otherwise. The history behind it makes sense, it’s not all that much different than the way most other jurisdictions used to operate, albeit many years ago.
The number of cars running around with these adornments, especially the occasional hand-written one, gives the place an, ahem, “traditional” feel. Yeah, “traditional,” I’ll use a nice word to describe it…
But seriously, thanks for the lesson.
WOW!!! The hatred for GM is only surpassed by the hatred for Trump.
HI!!!
If you find ads from other manufacturers with issues, please let me know and I’ll write them up.
I HAVE ISSUE WITH THE FACT THAT FORD NEGLECTED THE PANTHER PLATFORM INTO OBLIVION. GET ON IT CHOP CHOP
New for 1979, the Continental Town Car Collector’s Edition.
***swoon***
By Pucci!
There was no designer trim applied on top of the Collector’s Edition!
Corey is also the Brougham Nazi.
The brass buttons on my embroidered jacket are very shiny.
“Corey is also the Brougham Nazi.”
Would that be pronounced “BRO-hum,” “brouhm,” or “Bro-HAM?”
Hehehehe!
The most recent manufacturer pronunciation of the word can be found in the 92-96 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham manufacturer’s video.
Wherein, it is pronounced “Brome.”
Normandy is a feint!
A Sajeev “trigger phrase!’
He just might need a safe space!
The bigger issue is the term “professional grade” which is entirely meaningless. It just sounds silly when applied to crossovers like the Acadia and Terrain. And, while it’s a little more apropos for the trucks, you can get vehicles of the same “grade” wearing Chevy badges and sometimes even Cadillac.
There is no structured definition for a “Professional” grade of car, but it sure makes for some attractive advertising. Whatever makes people feel better about spending more money, right?
To me, a Professional Grade product just means it’s used in the course of one’s daily profession/job and is designed around their specific needs. I would generally expect the product to be either more ergonomic, durable, powerful, efficient or precise than the non-“professional” product.
I mainly think marketing departments use it loosely to differentiate a high-priced product line from other product lines from the same manufacturer. There isn’t much functional difference between a GMC and the Chevy that rolls off the production line right behind it. Especially considering you can spec most Chevys almost identically to the matching GMC.
“Professional grade” is just their answer to “Ford tough.”
Meh give me the option of LineX as a floor covering instead of carpet and I’ll acknowledge that it really is “professional grade.”
If Ford offered that, would that make it “professional grade tough?” :O
Anyway, the other thing this reminds me of is the “police” options and “heavy duty” options that used to be more common in the 1970s. Back when you could order a new car a-la carte.
“At Ford, Quality ams Job 1!”
(I’ve had to replace a 3V 5.4, so I get to mock Ford Quality until THE END OF TIME.
I will give Ford credit that the REST of the drivetrain on my F250 is very sturdy, and the truck itself is very well built.)
Actual Professional Grade is a rubber floor, vinyl seats and dust in every crevice.
This here’s nothing but an Eminence Front.
Until 1974 when GMC stopped producing their own engines you could argue they were professional grade as defined by greater durability under adverse conditions. Now professional grade GMC seems to be almost entirely based on having more fake wood and plastic chrome than the Chevy equivalent, but less than the Cadillac version.
^^^THIS^^^
Very nice, man.
I had always pictured GMC as the Mercury to Chevy’s Ford.
(Why did I just have a mental image of Calvin pi$$ing on ME??!!)
No flames, please!
Yeah, but if it was a GMC/Mercury bumper sticker then it would be a *classy* version of Calvin. Better clothes and a nicer haircut, that kind of thing.
I’m more concerned that 162 people took the time to comment on a generic GMC online ad.
Most of them are roughly:
“i like this gm Arcade, my mom’s has one and my aunts’ is red and they like to drive around in them and they look good. No gas Problems mpg.
Juan Villallarta – you should get 1 4 ur mom!1! :F”
The ARCADIA mispronunciation thing really irks me.
My SIL had an Acadia for a bit and would always call it the “Arcadia”. Where did she get this ‘R’ from? Is Acadia really that hard to say?
Why do people feel the need to make random changes in grammar? Arcadia, chipolte, nucular, etc. It’s interesting how language evolves.
I don’t understand that, how people can extract letters from a word which don’t exist in that word.
Ask most anybody in the Midwest to read the big blue letters on the front of the grocery.
K R O G E R
Now what’s that say?
“Kroger’s.”
NO.
I got myself mildly annoyed with the Arcadia. Here you come reminding me of the “Krogers” abomination. Argh!
How many poor pronunciations does it take for these to become colloquialisms?
An even more topically relevant example: Ford’s. Just about everyone in the southeastern Michigan region has a relative or forebear who worked at Ford’s.
Here is one. …….Anamosa, IA v. Alamosa, CO?? Has any one run across this flub between the low land flat landers and the high country flat landers?
Arcadia with the R is an acceptable pronunciation on a single day every year. That day would be September 19th, which is Talk Like a Pirate Day!
Acadia is the only correct way for the other 364 1/4 days.
I think it might be a long “a” (“aaah-cadia”) corrupting to an “arr”?
(I mean, people back east say Washington as “Warshington” sometimes, so I don’t even know what.
n.b. pronunciation isn’t quite grammar, though.)
This is “r” sound where there is no letter is called the ‘intrusive’ R.
Its usually associated with England and Wales, although former commonwealth nations of the Southern hemisphere (Australia, NZ, India, South Africa) also have localized dialects where it shows up.
Anyway, this brings me to the point: the phenomenon of hypercorrective intrusive r. This is an American peculiarity whereby someone with a traditionally non-rhotic accent (as found in New York City and New England) hypercorrects and pronounces r regardless of whether it precedes a vowel.
Hence we get:
“I’ve got no idear what to wear!”
“He liked to drawr cats.”
“Brendar and Eddie were still going steady in the summer of ’75”
“Arcadia”
It drives me insane when I hear it.
“This is “r” sound where there is no letter is called the ‘intrusive’ R.
Its usually associated with…”
PIRATES! It’s usually associated with pirates!
Like when the British say BRANARNER.
“Like when the British say BRANARNER.”
I guess there are worcestershire examples.
“Its usually associated with…”
PIRATES! It’s usually associated with pirates!”
Well,you’re not wrong….
I thought the “warsh” thing was specific to Northwest Ohio. When I moved to the Toledo area from Detroit back in ’84, it sounded like a foreign language at first!
Corey: How about “RPM’s”(revolutions per minute) or “MPG’s” (miles per gallon)? And don’t even get me started on “so fun”!!! :-)
Arcadia is a local city in Southern California, and I used to think that was the name of the GMC crossover. That said, I can’t stand when people change existing words even after hearing it properly pronounced. I annoy my boyfriend sometimes by correcting his mispronunciations.
My personal favorite is when people on Craigslist sell ‘Turing’ models or Camerys.
Commandant Corey on grammar patrol. Respect his authoritah.
I’m just waiting for someone to tell him “the point is ‘mute\'”.
Its moo. Like a cow’s opinion, doesn’t matter!
Please, not the nukular option.
Does GM still spell gauge without the “u”?
In honor of a certain 18th century general in the British Army. (You just read it here on the internet, so it must be true!)
No, GM spelled it “Gage” because them there “U’s” ain’t free to produce for a few million units….
There is a secret memo that if they saved $.001 for each U multiplied by millions then they could leave the gas tanks behind the rear axle. Mwuahahaa!!
Language is often a casualty, even if quality is the intended focus:
https://s26.postimg.org/lin0coga1/Trailer_Of_Irony.jpg
>>> Browsing through Facebook <<<
I think I found your problem right there.
These things drive me crazy too, unfortunately they are becoming more common. The misuse of apostrophes however does not annoy me as much as the massive confusion between “lose” and “loose.”
+1,000,000!
The misuse of apostrophes is bad, but we are overlooking a far more pervasive and pernicious syntax violation: the omission of the dash in “professional-grade”. That crap just chaps my ass.
That is indeed a crappy, ass-chapping violation.
I watch this commercial for the new Acadia many times and every time I see it, I laugh! I happen to know a conductor and he drives around in a company S Class sedan.
Sh!t like that practically leaps off the page or screen at me, even as my spelling has worsened with age. (I second-guess myself even more, and my first instinct is usually correct.)
I especially go ape-feces over captions on TV news that use the incorrect spelling of a word (role/roll, and the like — is that a “homophone,” B&B)?
A friend’s refrigerator magnet describes me best: “I’m the grammar snob about whom your mother warned you!” ;-)