Journalists generally believe they're smarter than spell check. In fact, as of a few years ago, the J-School at the University of Maryland disabled spell check on all of its building's computers. Which means that a pocket of the D.C. Metro area probably enjoys unusually good dictionary sales.
For starters, spell check doesn't catch mistakes in areas like the contraction trinity -- your and you're, there, their and they're, were and we're. Let's not forget that it will never detect the always-hilarious but ultimately cringe-inducing public/pubic dichotomy (e.g, pubic servant, pubic comment period, public lice).
And there are times when its suggested spellings are ridiculous. In one instance, an absent-minded editor ran spell check, approved all the suggested changes without paying attention and posted the story to the Web, and that's how a source with a name resembling "Kenny Cercetti" became "Query Crete."
Journalists cannot entrust their careers and reputations with Bill Gates' dictionary, which even after the presidential inauguration still told users Obama was misspelled but didn't have a problem with Osama.
In a way, journalists are on the front lines of keeping machines from taking over civilization. Skynet probably got started when people started letting computers spell for them, and within a few years the entire human race was enslaved.
Spell check further reinforces journalists' sense of intellect since in many word-processing programs, misspelled words get automatically underscored with red squiggly lines. Which is fine if using standard grammar and words. But journalists do not use standard grammar and words. Between technical language, people's names and odd locations, a reporter's first draft can be marked with so many red squiggles it can make it look like the computer screen was bleeding.
Journalists may not always get the story right but at at least their errors are spelled corrrectly.
-Penned by journalist Robert Salonga who has pried off the F7 button from his keyboard.
