Most Bizarre Errors You Constantly See

[PainInTheAssInternet]

What are errors that make no sense yet are very widespread for some unknown reason?

I got to thinking about this during my incessant conversations on YouTube regarding Titanic. For some reason, a large number of the YouTube community have taken to calling her sister ship, Olympic, the Olympia.

Just a bit of information that really drives this into the dirt. The company that owned Titanic, the White Star Line, was in the habit of ending all their ships' names with -ic (Baltic, Celtic, Ionic, Doric, Suevic etc.) while their primary competitors, Cunard, ended their ships' names with -ia (Carpathia, Lusitania, Mauretania, Aquitania, Campania, etc).

Thus, calling Olympic the Olympia is effectively stating that she was a rival ship to her owners.

I have no idea why this persists, but I think I know where it originates. Does it originate from the Greek city of Olympia? A landmark? Other ships named Olympia? There certainly aren't any documentaries or documents that call her Olympia.

No. It comes from the gun in Call of Duty; Black Ops.

EDIT

I just thought of another. Misspelling in the age of autocorrect.

Misspelling a word in an article you just read.

So once again, what error is so popular but makes no sense whatsoever?

 

[Ldude893]

"Beam Me Up, Scotty" was never an actual quoted line in Star Trek, at least not directly. One high school class I had ridiculed me for saying that, but I guess it's my fault for not forcing them to search up that particular fact up themselves.

 

[NinjaSniperAssassin]

"Beam Me Up, Scotty" was never an actual quoted line in Star Trek, at least not directly. One high school class I had ridiculed me for saying that, but I guess it's my fault for not forcing them to search up that particular fact up themselves.

Neither was "Play it again, Sam". The actual Casablanca quote was just "Play it, Sam". I have a customer at work who requests his usual order by saying "Play it again, Sam", and I have to bite my tongue every time.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Yeah, lot of misquotes...but for some reason "Drink the Kool-Aid" is the one that gets me. It wasn't Kool-Aid, it was Flavor-Aid, or some other low budget imitation.

 

[FalloutJack]

I think the most bizarre errors would be the ones spoken here on the Escapist where you get people who speak out about things nobody likes in their defense...and no matter how much overwhelming information you give them, they juuust don't get it.

 

[Little Woodsman]

Where I live it's people not understanding that 'Hispanic' and 'Mexican' are *not* interchangeable terms! Drives me up the wall...

 

[Thaluikhain]

Where I live it's people not understanding that 'Hispanic' and 'Mexican' are *not* interchangeable terms! Drives me up the wall...

Oh yeah...likewise Muslim/Arab/Persian, and people not knowing where Africa and the Middle East are.

 

[skywolfblue]

I'll take "Every Explosion is a Gasoline Explosion"! I can understand pyromaniacs enjoying their art a leetle too much, but could we please get a few explosions that look like real explosions from time to time?

Using C4? Gasoline Explosion! TNT? Big red Gasoline Fireball!

 

[TheIceQueen]

Yeah, lot of misquotes...but for some reason "Drink the Kool-Aid" is the one that gets me. It wasn't Kool-Aid, it was Flavor-Aid, or some other low budget imitation.

Yeah, but, come on. Are you really going to call them Cloud Cakes if you buy Little Debbie's version, or are you going to call them Twinkies? You can call them whatever you want, Little Debbie's, but they're still Twinkies no matter what you do or say.

 

[Vegosiux]

"Well, that escalated quickly."

It's "Boy", not "Well". And the emphasis is on "quickly", not on "that".

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

The word "trope" pisses me off. Seriously, who started using it as a replacement for "stereotype", and why? The word has a meaning already, and it's not close to what people mean when they say "trope". So I don't get it. Is "stereotype" too long to say? Is it just a huge troll on behalf of some unknown wordsmith? Or do people just not know the meaning of words anymore.

 

[EeveeElectro]

The amount of people who think 'remedial' means stupid, slow or uneducated makes my blood boil.

'looking like a remedial shouting at my table when I walked into it!'

I can somewhat understand because you're given remedial classes if you're behind at school but it doesn't mean stupid.

And those who think 'wherefore art thou?' means 'where are you?' are getting fed to the bear.

 

[Lieju]

I think people not understanding what 'theory' means in a scientific context annoys me the most.
Also quantum. It's not magic.

The word "trope" pisses me off. Seriously, who started using it as a replacement for "stereotype", and why? The word has a meaning already, and it's not close to what people mean when they say "trope". So I don't get it. Is "stereotype" too long to say? Is it just a huge troll on behalf of some unknown wordsmith? Or do people just not know the meaning of words anymore.

Well, 'stereotype' is considered to be more negative.
I have been 'corrected' before on that for criticising portrayals of some minorities. "It's not a stereotype, it's a trope."
Yeah, whatever, my point still is that you wrote very one-dimensional characters in a cliched story.

 

[Thaluikhain]

The word "trope" pisses me off. Seriously, who started using it as a replacement for "stereotype", and why? The word has a meaning already, and it's not close to what people mean when they say "trope". So I don't get it. Is "stereotype" too long to say? Is it just a huge troll on behalf of some unknown wordsmith? Or do people just not know the meaning of words anymore.

Well, 'stereotype' is considered to be more negative.
I have been 'corrected' before on that for criticising portrayals of some minorities. "It's not a stereotype, it's a trope."
Yeah, whatever, my point still is that you wrote very one-dimensional characters in a cliched story.

Tropes also can apply to lots of thing other than characters. And, yeah, tropes can be good, things that get re-used a lot because they work.

 

[Hoplon]

The word "trope" pisses me off. Seriously, who started using it as a replacement for "stereotype", and why? The word has a meaning already, and it's not close to what people mean when they say "trope". So I don't get it. Is "stereotype" too long to say? Is it just a huge troll on behalf of some unknown wordsmith? Or do people just not know the meaning of words anymore.

Well, 'stereotype' is considered to be more negative.
I have been 'corrected' before on that for criticising a portrayals of some minorities. "It's not a stereotype, it's a trope."
Yeah, whatever, my point still is that you wrote very one-dimensional characters in a cliched story.

Actually it's because they are different things. a stereotype is defined as "a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing" A trope is a a common or overused theme or device in media. a trope could be used to subvert a stereotype or reinforce it, but they aren't the same thing.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

The word "trope" pisses me off. Seriously, who started using it as a replacement for "stereotype", and why? The word has a meaning already, and it's not close to what people mean when they say "trope". So I don't get it. Is "stereotype" too long to say? Is it just a huge troll on behalf of some unknown wordsmith? Or do people just not know the meaning of words anymore.

Well, 'stereotype' is considered to be more negative.
I have been 'corrected' before on that for criticising a portrayals of some minorities. "It's not a stereotype, it's a trope."
Yeah, whatever, my point still is that you wrote very one-dimensional characters in a cliched story.

Actually it's because they are different things. a stereotype is defined as "a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing" A trope is a a common or overused theme or device in media. a trope could be used to subvert a stereotype or reinforce it, but they aren't the same thing.

This is incorrect. The word when used properly only refers to words, not characters or stories or portrayals or device. Words.
Here's a few: "Washington" (when referring to the seat of power), "Banana" (when referring to a penis), "dough" (when referring to money).

A stereotype is something different entirely and doesn't refer to use of words.

Tropos in Greek means change or turn, the derivation pointing towards a word's meaning turned into something else.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

The first one is linked to my username on this site... I deliberately used the quote most attributable to the character, knowing that it was never in any of the books. The line was first used in a televised version of Holmes, and has become a kind of catchphrase for him since then.

A second of mine is that, ironically, one of the most commonly mispronounced words in the english language is 'pronunciation'. Notice the lack of second 'o'. This means it is pro-nun-see-a-shun, not pro-noun-see-a-shun. Pronounciate, pronunciation.

Finally... a bit more geeky, but it pisses me off in media when a smoke trail appears behind an RPG when it fires. In reality you would see an initial puff at the weapon system, followed very quickly by a second small puff ~11m from the operator. There is a very light wispy smoke trail, but it is hard to see, and you are more likely to see disturbed dust.
You definitely wouldn't see a smoketrail through NVGs or IR sighting. The bit that grips me even more is that the smoke trails they do use are actually what would be seen from a 1st generation MANPADS, a totally diferent style of weapon!

 

[Vegosiux]

The word "trope" pisses me off. Seriously, who started using it as a replacement for "stereotype", and why? The word has a meaning already, and it's not close to what people mean when they say "trope". So I don't get it. Is "stereotype" too long to say? Is it just a huge troll on behalf of some unknown wordsmith? Or do people just not know the meaning of words anymore.

Well, 'stereotype' is considered to be more negative.
I have been 'corrected' before on that for criticising a portrayals of some minorities. "It's not a stereotype, it's a trope."
Yeah, whatever, my point still is that you wrote very one-dimensional characters in a cliched story.

Actually it's because they are different things. a stereotype is defined as "a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing" A trope is a a common or overused theme or device in media. a trope could be used to subvert a stereotype or reinforce it, but they aren't the same thing.

This is incorrect. The word when used properly only refers to words, not characters or stories or portrayals or device. Words.
Here's a few: "Washington" (when referring to the seat of power), "Banana" (when referring to a penis), "dough" (when referring to money).

A stereotype is something different entirely and doesn't refer to use of words.

Language evolves. In ye olde times, "protest", for example, meant pretty much the exact opposite of what we think of today when we heard the word. Currently, the consensus on the word "trope" seems to be that it refers to a literary tool, be it cliche, stereotype, or neither (e.g. "Chekov's Gun" - that's not stereotyping anything, it's a literary device that plays on how something that looks like a minor detail now ends up being very important to the plot later - because unless it's important to the plot, it should not be there in the first place...this second part is often forgotten...).

Also...

Tropos in Greek means change or turn, the derivation pointing towards a word's meaning turned into something else.

Well, going to my example, when "Chekov's Gun" is referred to as a trope, the meaning of the expression is indeed turned from "a gun owned by one Chekov" into something else, so according to your own statement, yes, trope.

 

[Queen Michael]

Yeah, lot of misquotes...but for some reason "Drink the Kool-Aid" is the one that gets me. It wasn't Kool-Aid, it was Flavor-Aid, or some other low budget imitation.

Actcually, criminal investigators at the inquest said they found packets of "cool aid" [sic], and it's not really clear what the cult used, since both Flavor-Aid and Kool-Aid were among the commune's supplies.
(Source: Wikipedia.)

 

[Saulkar]

My dad made me mildly pedantic after I learned that he was using the word "Ignorant" as a substitute for "rude" and still does it to this day. Me and my brothers always retort with "Actually we are quite aware of our actions".

Interestingly enough I encounter this frequently in day to day life.