Comment by boppo1
5 years ago
> wanted me to use it as a sort of proof reader.
I can't imagine working in a place like this. I often write with some unusual but perfectly valid grammar constructions that are a result of being well read. Running what I've written, the codification of my thoughts, through a statistical homogenization machine is dystopian in a way I had never imagined. What kind of business was it?
Imagine running famous writers through this thing, even if they're just journalists. Gross. I'm gonna run Moby Dick through Grammarly later and see what it has to say.
While I don't use Grammarly, this doesn't strike me as a very fair description of what grammar checkers are meant to do. Just like spellcheckers, they only make the changes you let them make. If you blindly accept every suggestion they make, then yes, I suppose you're running your text "through a statistical homogenization machine," but that's even more foolish than blindly accepting every suggestion a spellchecker makes.
I do use a "grammar and style check" built into Ulysses fairly frequently, even on fiction. This is a server-side service like Grammarly, but without the keylogging-ish aspects. (It only works in Ulysses, and you have to explicitly go into "revision mode" and click the "Check Text" button.) And, sure, it's optimized for business writing and is going to make a lot of dumb suggestions. But not all the suggestions are dumb; it really does catch genuine mistakes and even make style suggestions worth considering (e.g., "the phrase here is so overused it's in our database as an overused phrase, so are you sure you want to use it"). And, of course, sometimes I really am writing something for business, and some of the suggestions that are superfluous in creative writing might actually be useful.
I don't like Grammarly's approach explicitly because of the "send everything to Grammarly in the background", but I think people write off style checkers as pointless a little too quickly. Even the stupidest grammar checker, like the one built into macOS (sorry, Apple), will catch things like inadvertently doubled words, which is something I'm prone to do when I pause in the middle of writing a sentence to collect my thoughts.
> I do use a "grammar and style check" built into Ulysses fairly frequently,
I parsed this sentence as you running Grammarly on the novel by James Joyce, which would be an interesting experiment given that Joyce deliberately changes his style and grammar to mimic famous authors of the day, sometimes mid-sentence.
I have a strong suspicion Ulysses would fail miserably checking Ulysses. :)
> I often write with some unusual but perfectly valid grammar constructions that are a result of being well read.
That's lovely for you. It sounds like you're very clever. However, most writing in the workplace is intended to communicate concrete ideas, and benefits more from clarity than cleverness.
That doesn't have to mean, and in fact should NOT mean, bland.
I think one of the important things you should be thinking about is whether (given your complexity is already tripping up automated tools) it will start tripping up your coworkers.
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Bland poetry is bad.
Bland biz comms are not only acceptable but preferred.
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I hear clever and I think of the scene from Fight Club. Clever is not something good.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PXcEPSUl0uE
I hate to break it to you, but you’re not writing Moby Dick at your office job. You’re trying to communicate a (possibly complex) idea in a way that another person can understand it and make a decision.
> Running what I've written, the codification of my thoughts, through a statistical homogenization machine is dystopian in a way I had never imagined.
This is why Grammarly exists.
And if you can't do it without Grammarly, maybe you shouldn't have that job.
My dude. I have worked with quite a few really smart engineers whose grasp on the English language was imperfect, though quite capable of communicating most points well enough. I would prefer it if I could take a little less time in my code reviews on copy editing, doing things like fixing plurality disagreements and false cognates.
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And if you can’t code without Google, maybe you shouldn’t have that job.
Tools exist to help us. Use them.
> I hate to break it to you, but you’re not writing Moby Dick at your office job.
What if he does? Do you like generalization?
Read his writing. Moby Dick isn’t coming out of his keyboard unless he’s retyping it.
You're missing the value-prop of Grammarly -- to help someone who doesn't know write more like a fluent native English speaker. Helping someone write "more average" is exactly the point until they're fluent enough to know when and how to break the rules.
Wait until you find out about the 5 paragraph essay that's taught in HS that follows this model.
> who doesn't know write
In my experience it doesn't.
It helps people who are already reasonable good at writing English to write slightly better. Through only if their writing is limited to "business" English.
For e.g. papers it's in my experience a catastrophe.
There are also multiple categories of errors it can't cope with and does bad recommendation for. It's the kinda of errors I'm doing a lot. Maybe due to having some dyslexia, maybe because it's my second language, or maybe because my brain thinks slightly different (not joking; Luckily it's just different, not worse.).
Ten years ago I went back to school and finished my BS. All of the instructors required us to run our work through a plagiarism checker and certify that it was our original work when turned in. The plagiarism checker was part of a suite of tools that included a grammar checker, and some instructors used the grammar checker themselves when grading student work.
I always viewed the grammar checker as a crutch and only used it when required, but some students I worked with on team projects were obsessed with getting no warnings from the grammar check. There were a few ESL students that produced almost unintelligible work that had passed grammar check, and they argued with me when I tried to help them.
My best experience was when one instructor ran my work through the grammar check and then sent me the graded paper (A) which included his long critique of the changes the grammar checker had recommended.
> You're missing the value-prop of Grammarly -- to help someone who doesn't know write more like a fluent native English speaker.
That's not a part of the value of Grammarly. The tool is going to recommend mistakes; if you can't recognize them, then it will hurt you a lot more than it helps.
I couldn't either. I don't work there anymore.
> Imagine running famous writers through this thing, even if they're just journalists. Gross.
Try comparing the text of a Great Illustrated Classic book to the text of the actual book it "adapts".
The goal is not to make famous writers write like journalists. It is to make people who struggle with writing write at the level of journalists.