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Words or phrases that annoy you (even if you can't explain why) . . .

Scepticalscribe said:
... and, for that matter, spelling ...
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Relevant to this forum is the fact that iPhones seem to have awful auto-correct, It will happily take a word which was typed correctly and change it to something else, even after you're typing the next word.

Also, if you slightly mistype a word, it appears to have close to zero intelligence - artificial or otherwise - when picking the word it thinks you wanted to type.

Occasionally, people who don't already have the best spelling skills will make the reasonable assumption that the phone is correct. Which then reinforces Apple's correction algorithm and eventually we'll all be dragged into a random collection of phonetically-spelt words registered by people who don't pronounce words properly in the first place :)
 
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polyphenol said:
I'm quite sure there are many other such word pairings which I do not know, and likely get wrong.

But this particular one, it takes conversations like this for me to even realise they can be confused. Maybe pronunciation affects this? The way I speak, and those round me most of my life, they sound very different.
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Absolutely this affects misuse of words, and the lack of ability to distinguish one from another, or even realize that there are two words that exist with a similar sound and spelling.

My reply to post quoted above (#2615): "To each they're own." ;)
 
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Note that most of these confusions tend to be unidirectional, i.e. people confuse one word for the other, but not the other way around:

weary when you mean wary
then when you mean than
breath when you mean breathe

There's one word that is more familiar, and one that is less.

Confusions are even more common in idioms and fixed expressions. The other day I said "raring to go", then thought, "wait, is it 'rearing to go'?" I couldn't recall, especially since "raring" is not a word I would use in daily life; it is exists mostly in the expression. I looked it up, confirmed "raring" was correct, and also discovered that "raring" comes from "rear", that they are etymologically connected.

Cf. also "all of the sudden", an idiomatic confusion arising from a mishearing. And the other day I saw someone write "part for the course". Was it auto-correct or someone not knowing the expression "par for the course" and approximating it based on sound? It was used in the correct context; they just got one of the words wrong.

All you can do is educate. :)
 
adrianlondon said:
Relevant to this forum is the fact that iPhones seem to have awful auto-correct, It will happily take a word which was typed correctly and change it to something else, even after you're typing the next word.

Also, if you slightly mistype a word, it appears to have close to zero intelligence - artificial or otherwise - when picking the word it thinks you wanted to type.

Occasionally, people who don't already have the best spelling skills will make the reasonable assumption that the phone is correct. Which then reinforces Apple's correction algorithm and eventually we'll all be dragged into a random collection of phonetically-spelt words registered by people who don't pronounce words properly in the first place :)
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Recently I've found it seems desperate to convert things to "iOS" - but I'm not even sure what I am typing that makes is so keen to do that.
 
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adrianlondon said:
Relevant to this forum is the fact that iPhones seem to have awful auto-correct, It will happily take a word which was typed correctly and change it to something else, even after you're typing the next word.

Also, if you slightly mistype a word, it appears to have close to zero intelligence - artificial or otherwise - when picking the word it thinks you wanted to type.

Occasionally, people who don't already have the best spelling skills will make the reasonable assumption that the phone is correct. Which then reinforces Apple's correction algorithm and eventually we'll all be dragged into a random collection of phonetically-spelt words registered by people who don't pronounce words properly in the first place :)
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While I can appreciate that and the old numeric keypad A9text entry assistance, parents and teachers are there to inform children.

If children grow into ignorant adults, it is not the fault of technology.
 
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bousozoku said:
While I can appreciate that and the old numeric keypad A9text entry assistance, parents and teachers are there to inform children.

If children grow into ignorant adults, it is not the fault of technology.
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Again, agreed.

Yes, there is proper teaching, but there is also the basic act of reading, and that means, reading regularly so that one absorbs, learns (and understands) how (and where) words are used; reading is how many of us acquired a vocabulary, and learned to recognise when, where (and why) certain words (and not those that resemble them) are used in a specific, given, context, setting and sentence.
 
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"Apple Tax"

So many posts complaining about the "Apple Tax". Don't see posts about the "Mercedes", "Patek watch", "Rojas Haute Luxe Parfum", Tesla software upgrade "taxes" although there are complaints about the cost.

Replacing an Audi headlight bulb cost me ~$500. Even more expensive for a Porsche. I believe BMW repairs are even more expensive. A simple gasket for a Kuhn Rikon pressure cooker braiser is $50. People complain about the pricing for premium products upgrades and repairs but don't call it a tax.

Why they think when you buy a premium brand you should pay budget brand pricing for upgrades and repairs is beyond me.
 
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HDFan said:
"Apple Tax"

So many posts complaining about the "Apple Tax". Don't see posts about the "Mercedes", "Patek watch", "Rojas Haute Luxe Parfum", Tesla software upgrade "taxes" although there are complaints about the cost.

Replacing an Audi headlight bulb cost me ~$500. Even more expensive for a Porsche. I believe BMW repairs are even more expensive. A simple gasket for a Kuhn Rikon pressure cooker braiser is $50. People complain about the pricing for premium products upgrades and repairs but don't call it a tax.

Why they think when you buy a premium brand you should pay budget brand pricing for upgrades and repairs is beyond me.
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Do you think that the same people would complain (or, complain as loudly), if, rather than the expression "Apple Tax", one used instead "Apple Extra Profit"?

Nevertheless, while I take the point about "premium pricing", (and the ascribed assumptions that go along with the purchase of such goods and services), I also suspect that there is more to this than is covered by your post.

Premium products, by their very nature, tend to be niche products, with a largely self-selecting consumer base.

Personally, I have never minded paying a premium price for a product, good, or service, but for that money, I expect a premium product, and premium customer care.

These days, Apple is a veritable behemoth of a company, enormously wealthy, with a vast global footprint, and - as part of the tech revolution - is now far more influential (and politically and economically powerful) than (mere) premium automobile manufacturers can ever hope to be.

More to the point, I suspect that there is a co-relation with both Apple's global reach, and their (deteriorating) customer care (which used to be superb, and is something I can personally attest to).

Furthermore, nowadays, Apple is a company that no longer even needs its computing arm, and can afford to retain it as a luxury loss-leader, and is no longer defined by its cutting edge R&D in computer development, for other areas (the iPhone, the Apple Watch) are far more profitable.

However, even more to the point, I also strongly suspect that there is a part of Apple's customer base which has never forgiven the company for becoming a global giant, for they loved the days when Apple pandered to them (or marketed to them) on the basis that they were an esoteric elite, the "cool kids", who celebrated - for they recognised - that fusion of form and function that represented Apple design at its best. Sharing that with the less enlightened masses - along with the fact that Apple no longer needs to woo nerds - must be an unsettling experience.
 
HDFan said:
"Apple Tax"

So many posts complaining about the "Apple Tax". Don't see posts about the "Mercedes", "Patek watch", "Rojas Haute Luxe Parfum", Tesla software upgrade "taxes" although there are complaints about the cost.
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Yarp. It's a luxury tax. Some brand has become so dominant that it becomes synonymous with that product/service. Xerox copy instead of photocopy, Kleenex instead of tissue paper, Band-Aid instead adhesive bandage, Photoshop instead of photo editing and so on.

Apple dominates the premium phone and tablet market. Hail, kids today refers to any tablet as an iPad, even if it's an Android device.

Apple Tax. Such a stupid term, but I've come to terms with that term.;)
HDFan said:
Why they think when you buy a premium brand you should pay budget brand pricing for upgrades and repairs is beyond me.
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Well, if it's the same part, I see no reason why one should cost several times more. It reminds me of one story start of Lamborghini and Ferrari rivalry. TL;DR version: The 1000 lire clutch used in the Ferrari supercar is the same 10 lire clutch used in some Lamborghini farm tractors.
 
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Scepticalscribe said:
and their (deteriorating) customer care (which used to be superb, and is something I can personally attest to).
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Not my experience. Sure you can get a not so great support rep and I did get one terrible rep last year who laughed at me. I make hundreds of support calls a year, thousands over decades with 100's of companies and Apple is firmly in the top tier. I haven't seen any deterioration in their support. The time to get a bug fixed may be longer but that is to be expected with a company whose headcount has increased 10X since 2005 (~14.8K in 2005 to~165k in 2024). Things slow down as you have to have more bureaucracy to manage all of those employees.

But having a career in support myself I accept the fact there will be differences in the support I get. Carbon Copy Cloner support requests are answered immediately and I get great results. Had an issue with Sophos which took some months to diagnose but ended up with them rewriting some of their backend code.

Apple is totally different than these smaller companies. They likely receive millions of support calls and have thousands of requests and bugs that they have to process. Consequently you have to start with a standard customer representative, go to a senior representative and maybe a manager. Support has limited means for contacting development and you rarely, if ever, directly communicate with them.

This doesn't happen in a smaller company where the developer is in the room next door to the guy doing support.

So it takes longer to resolve issues when dealing with a large organization. Even when an issue is identified you then enter the prioritization process as to when, and if, a bug will be fixed. You are at the mercy of the number of users having reported the bug, the current state and planned future state of the code, and resource issues.
 
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Gregg2 said:
"hijacked thread"

so annoying
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Yes, agreed, and I must confess that I fell for it, and allowed myself to be distracted.

Anyway, the fork in that road occurred with the introduction of the term "Apple Tax" to the thread, along with a stated dislike of the term on the part of the individual who had introduced it to the discussion.

However, I am still unclear which word - whether it was "Apple", or, "Tax" - or the unfortunate conjunction of the two - that gave rise to the clear disgruntlement expressed.

But, agreed, there is ample space and place for the discussion of matters - and words - relating to Apple elsewhere on the site.
 
Scepticalscribe said:
there is ample space and place for the discussion of matters - and words - relating to Apple elsewhere on the site.
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Since the title of this thread is "Words or phrases that annoy you" and the phrase "Apple Tax" annoys me why is a discussion of it here not appropriate?
 
HDFan said:
Since the title of this thread is "Words or phrases that annoy you" and the phrase "Apple Tax" annoys me why is a discussion of it here not appropriate?
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Because of the fact - as was made more than abundantly clear by what happened in the thread once you had mentioned the expression "Apple Tax" (and, alas, and alack and most unfortunately, I was equally culpable in facilitating this) - introducing anything that refers to Apple (irrespective of whether it is something perceived as a tax or anything else) runs the risk of derailing the thread, as the subsequent emphasis of the direction the discussion took was all about Apple, rather than focussing on the term "tax" and its weird use in this particular context.

Moreover, as the rest of the site is dedicated to, devoted to, discussion on anything and everything to do with Apple, I am not so sure that it is necessary to introduce that subject matter into a perfectly interesting thread that addresses and explores the topic of words, language, and phrases that annoy us.
 
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OK, I'll offer a phrase from the sports world that annoys me: "defensive possession". I've heard this from announcers of football and basketball games. Obviously, the offense possesses the ball. What's wrong with "defensive stand"?

I've never heard that during a baseball game, the only sport I know much about where the defense possesses the ball. I suppose that's true in cricket as well, but I'm not sure how similar it is to baseball.
 
polyphenol said:
Add "bud"/"buddy". (Though it might feel different elsewhere than my corner of the world.)
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Someone called me that yesterday. Not as bad as "bro," but definitely somewhere in the bottom 5!

Also, I will never be someone's "dude" or "bro," but they will also never be mine either. I address people by their real names, and prefer to be addressed by mine, too.
 
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HDFan said:
"Apple Tax"
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I agree, but I wonder if users in their (BMW, Mercedes, etc) forums have similar terms?

While this might be slightly off topic... One recent thing I see here at MR, is the use of "a$$le", as a derogatory against Apple. Some use it at every single opportunity and I can only picture them, smirking with smugness, as they type it.
 
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