Avoid This From Happening

sassandgroove · Sep 8, 2006

ARRRGH!!!

I work for a company that sells trade show displays. It is our business to help companies put their best foot forward. At least, that is how I see it. But I am the Office Administrator, not a sales consultant.

We have one client, I won't say who, but they are a gov't agency....

oh, how do I explain? Their display involves Smokey the bear and forest fires. They have a photo of a forest on fire and in the next panel they have photos of people camping and fishing and general serene nature scenes. BUt the text...oh the text.

Basically they are trying to say to prevent forest fires so you can enjoy said serene scenes. This is what they wanted orginally(text above photos):
Avoid this from happening....so you can enjoy this.

Ugh. I told the sales consultant it needs to be, if anything Prevent this from happening. BUt really, it should only be Prevent This.

He said "We have bigger fish to fry." ARRGH!!! If they put Avoid this from happening, people will notice it is WRONG, and they'll look bad and WE will look bad. BUt does anyone listen to ME?

Now before I go off feelin' to sorry for myself, I noticed a new proof that said Prevent this from happening. which is still Wrong, but is at least an improvement. Does this stuff bother you, too?

Aubrey · Sep 8, 2006

That sounds like some Engrish sign you'd see in Japan; almost right but not quite there. Seeing as how it was Americans who did this, it loses are charm and just looks silly.

veinglory · Sep 8, 2006

How... just... urk.

How about saying "I am happied to do this as wrongly as you desire"

Patricia · Sep 8, 2006

I hate things like that. People associate signs like that as patriotic American info. Makes us look dumb

Soccer Mom · Sep 8, 2006

Oh, that is painful. I wondered when I saw the title thread. It didn't sound like you to butcher the language

Sigh.

SeanDSchaffer · Sep 8, 2006

Like someone said above, the original version of that sign makes Americans look dumb. I mean, if we can't get our native language right, how can people expect us to continue as a world power?

This is just plain sad.

sassandgroove · Sep 11, 2006

I knew you all would understand.

CaroGirl · Sep 11, 2006

Oh my. Ew. Their first version of the sign is just obtuse.

But the second, the one using "Prevent...from" doesn't sound wrong to me. You can prevent things from happening (unless I'm reading something wrong). You can say "Prevent the bowl from falling over by using a non-skid surface."

sassandgroove · Sep 11, 2006

Right, Caro, but I think for their purposes, Prevent This would be enough. THe fewer words the better. It's a big wall size mural, people get turned off by a lot of words. That is another thing we have trouble getting across to the client. ETA: But like I said, it was the Avoid this from happening that really irked me.

CaroGirl · Sep 11, 2006

sassandgroove said:
THe fewer words the better.

Oh absolutely! But, failing that, and first and foremost, at least get it grammatically correct, right?! There's nothing like seeing a big, bold mistake, in a thousand-point font, to dispel any doubt about incompetence (grammatical or otherwise).

Sass, you did a good thing. Even if they go for the longer corrected sign, you've saved the world (or at the least the US) from one more egregious published error. Well done!

MidnightMuse · Sep 11, 2006

You know, as a government employee (but not the faction in question

) I can commiserate! I see things here all the time that were official documents and press releases that just make my head spin.

It's embarassing.

Tracy · Sep 17, 2006

There's a website called www.overseaspropertys.com.
Apart from making me cringe, I would so hesitate to do business with a company that was unprofessional enough to make such a mistake.

Patricia · Sep 17, 2006

Tracy said:
There's a website calledwww.overseaspropertys.com.
Apart from making me cringe, I would so hesitate to do business with a company that was unprofessional enough to make such a mistake.

That is probably not a mistake. Sometimes with domain names, one must settle for a vaiation in spelling to get the domain name that makes a statement. www.overseasproperties.com is already taken by someone else. Dave K. of Preditors and Editors http://www.sfwa.org/prededitors/ had to use a variation to get his domain name.

Ralyks · Sep 18, 2006

I don't think "Prevent this from happening" is grammatically incorrect. It's just redundant.

Aubrey · Sep 18, 2006

If the spelling overseas properties was taken, wouldn't it make more sense to just go with something describing the company for their domain or, if possible change the extention to .net? I'm sure they're a great company, but i wouldn't want to use it if they had a grammar error that glaring in their site name.

Shweta · Sep 18, 2006

Oh man.

"Avoid this from happening" reads to me like one of those self-explanatory sentences, like "This sentence no verb".

The thing we are avoiding, clearly, is a sentence like that one.

Which is to say, it hurts my head and now I want it on a t-shirt.

Patricia · Sep 18, 2006

Aubrey said:
If the spelling overseas properties was taken, wouldn't it make more sense to just go with something describing the company for their domain or, if possible change the extention to .net? I'm sure they're a great company, but i wouldn't want to use it if they had a grammar error that glaring in their site name.

.net and .org are taken also. I agree it looks tacky, However it’s a competitive world on the net and you will find those types of gimmicks more than in real time, In checking the rest of their site it's obvious that the domain name is important to them. For one thing it will google them up when people are looking for "overseas property.” The rest of the site doesn't convey to me a lack of intelligence, just a good business sense. So I suppose if it meant money in my pocket, or they could find me the property I was looking for, the domain name wouldn't throw me off, for sure. And given the mentality of people we've been discussing here--I doubt many would even notice the domain name extension.

sassandgroove · Sep 18, 2006

Shweta said:
Oh man.

"Avoid this from happening" reads to me like one of those self-explanatory sentences, like "This sentence no verb".

The thing we are avoiding, clearly, is a sentence like that one.

Which is to say, it hurts my head and now I want it on a t-shirt.

Excellent Idea, Shweta!

Avoid This From Happening

sassandgroove

Sassy haircut

Aubrey

veinglory

volitare nequeo

Patricia

California Dreaming

Soccer Mom

Crypto-fascist

SeanDSchaffer

sassandgroove

Sassy haircut

CaroGirl

Living the dream

sassandgroove

Sassy haircut

CaroGirl

Living the dream

MidnightMuse

Midnight Reading

Tracy

Patricia

California Dreaming

Ralyks

Untold stories inside

Aubrey

Shweta

Sick and absent

Patricia

California Dreaming

sassandgroove

Sassy haircut