Skitt's Law / Muphry's Law

Printer-friendly version

Author: 

Taxonomy upgrade extras: 

Just poking around the 'nets and I tripped over something I'd like to share. I've been waaaaay guilty of this myself, so I'm not posting it to shame anyone, just for the lulz (as the kids say). (Disclaimer: stolen wholesale from Wikipedia. No original content beyond this point. Formatting automagically screwed up by cut-n-paste. See the original in Wikipedia if you want to see the footnotes.)

Skitt's Law:

A corollary of Muphry's law, variously expressed as, "Any post correcting an error in another post will contain at least one error itself," or, "The likelihood of an error in a post is directly proportional to the embarrassment it will cause the poster."

Muphry's Law:

Muphry's law is an adage that states that "if you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written." The name is a deliberate misspelling of "Murphy's law."

John Bangsund of the Society of Editors (Victoria) in Australia identified Muphry's law as "the editorial application of the better-known Murphy's law"[5][6] and set it down in 1992 in the Society of Editors Newsletter.[7]
The law, as set out by Bangsund, states that:
(a) if you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written;
(b) if an author thanks you in a book for your editing or proofreading, there will be mistakes in the book;
(c) the stronger the sentiment expressed in (a) and (b), the greater the fault;
(d) any book devoted to editing or style will be internally inconsistent.[7]
It goes on to say:
Muphry's Law also dictates that, if a mistake is as plain as the nose on your face, everyone can see it but you. Your readers will always notice errors in a title, in headings, in the first paragraph of anything, and in the top lines of a new page. These are the very places where authors, editors and proofreaders are most likely to make mistakes.[5]

Comments

Even in published works...

It was widely remarked upon the book's publication that Lynne Truss' book "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" contained numerous punctuation errors...

...the book was subtitled The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation.

Oops!

 

Bike Resources

There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...

As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!

R. D. Jones and the sewing machine

The following is supposedly an ad from a real-life newspaper which appeared four days in a row—the last three hopelessly trying to correct the first day's mistake. Of course, this could just be an urban legend, but it is a good example of Skitt's Law.

Monday:
For sale: R. D. Jones has one sewing machine for sale. Phone 948-0707 after 7 P.M.. and ask for Mrs. Kelly who lives with him cheap.

Tuesday:
Notice: We regret having erred In R. D. Jones' ad yesterday. It should have read "One sewing machine for sale cheap. Phone 948-0707 and ask for Mrs. Kelly, who lives with him after 7 P.M."

Wednesday:
Notice: R. D. Jones has informed us that he has received several annoying telephone calls because of the error we made in the classified ad yesterday. The ad stands correct as follows: "For sale -- R. D. Jones has one sewing machine for sale. Cheap. Phone 948-0707 after 7 P.M. and ask for Mrs. Kelly who loves with him."

Thursday:
Notice: I, R. D. Jones, have no sewing machine for sale. I intentionally broke it. Don't call 948-0707 as I have had the phone disconnected. I have not been carrying on with Mrs. Kelly. Until yesterday she was my housekeeper, but she has now quit.

Problematic Statements


Bike Resources

The Grauniad

Guardian newspaper is famous for its spelling errors. One classic was an article on the Eisteddfod, where that word was spelled correctly everywhere except in the banner headline.
Both the place mats of a certain chain of roadside eateries and the satirical mag Private Eye carried the name of a Welsh village, and both spelled it wrongly. Mind you, the name of the place was Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch...