Double-take, # 240

A noun-verb mismatch in the headline is supported by an odd turn of phrase in the subheading, plus a possible eggcorn:

Link: WalesOnline

Box of retro Wales shirts […] are discovered; youth shirts; packages for packaging

Spellchecking Is Never Enough, # 230

Is this mangle a slip or an eggcorn? It comes from an item entirely based on an examination of posts on social media, a cheap, lazy and unsatisfactory method of ‘reporting’ that has now become ubiquitous:

Link: The Express, ‘Paxman Praised for Shining Light on REAL EU but Europhiles Complain of “BBC BIAS”’

bias for biassed/biased

Double-take, # 218

The penultimate seasonal mangle of Easter 2016 comes from Waitrose (and has been sitting in the ‘seasonal’ folder since last year, awaiting its moment). It’s hard to tell whether it is a typographical slip or an attempt to make an unfamiliar word logical:

Link: Waitrose Media Centre, ‘Sinmel Cake’

Sinmel cake

The Wrong Word Entirely, # 96

A moment’s aberration, a pesky homophone or a rather ineffectual eggcorn? Now corrected, as is the original URL based on it:

Link: The Telegraph, ‘“I could walk around starkers if I wanted to […]”’

peace of mind

The Wrong Word Entirely, # 92

This was submitted by John Holloway, with the caption ‘Horseplay at Skyscanner?’ It is a companion mangle to one featured last year (12 April, 2014). It may be a typographical error; this time there is certainly no possibility of allowing it as an eggcorn:

Link: Skyscanner, ‘Carry on: readers’ opinions on cabin luggage restrictions’

confusion reins

The Wrong Word Entirely, # 85

Suzanne Sirett found this mangle on the Facebook page of ABC, the Australian Broadcasting Cor­por­a­tion. The corresponding webpage has been corrected, but the second graphic below (a screenshot of the top result from an Internet search) shows that the error was originally there. It is difficult to tell whether the mangle is a typographical error or an eggcorn:

Link: Facebook, ABC News, post of 14 July, 2015, at 11.44

Source: Google search on "Protestor Helen Bayes told the ABC they were baring", 14 July, 13:02

baring witness

The Wrong Word Entirely, # 84

It’s hard to tell whether this error is the journalist’s or the bank’s, although surely the former should have corrected it anyway. Since t and p are not adjacent on the keyboard, it’s probably not a typographical error, and is more likely to be a mondegreen or eggcorn since, when sounded with a glottal stop, the wrong word can barely, if at all, be distinguished from the correct word. Similar errors in published writing and in students’ written work suggest that this is becoming an increasingly common problem.

Link: The Sunday Times (subscription access only), ‘Scandal of the missing cash from dormant RBS account’

upmost for utmost

The Wrong Word Entirely, # 40

This extract comes from an article posted on a telecommunications company’s intranet. The key mangle — Cf. this mangle from last year — may be a misapprehension or a typographical error:

 free reign; practise for practice