Versus

“Please call me David.” vs. “Please call me, David.”

Commas, Common English Blunders, Versus

Open the text-messaging app on your smartphone, touch the microphone icon, and try dictating the imperative “Please call me, David.” as a text message. You should expect to get “Please call me David” instead. Speech-to-text technology in these apps often does not treat pauses as anything special.

You might type a period to terminate the sentence, but you might miss the need to insert the comma where it is needed.

Now, imagine three things:

  1. You are sending the text message to a man by the name of David.
  2. He knows you as John Smith.
  3. He has heard rumors that you might go by a different name.

Now consider two different messages that this man could get, depending on whether you inserted a comma after “me” in your imperative message.

“Please call me David.”

This is asking the recipient to refer to you by the name “David” (instead of by “John” or “Mr. Smith” in our imaginary example).

“Please call me, David.”

This is asking the recipient to telephone you.

Conclusion

If you want someone to refer to you by the name “David”, then send a “Please call me David.” text message.

If you want someone to telephone you and that person’s name is David, then send a “Please call me, David.” text message.

“How are you gorgeous?” vs. “How are you, gorgeous?”

Commas, Common English Blunders, Versus

Proper use of commas is becoming a lost art. Many children are not learning how to use commas. And, smartphones are not helping.

For example, dictate “How are you, gorgeous?” into the speech-to-text feature of the text-messaging app of your smartphone, and you likely will get “How are you gorgeous” instead.

Current speech-to-text technology does not detect the inflection of a question. Still, many users of this technology will resolve this by typing a question mark before sending the message.

But, many users will not insert the comma when it is needed.

“How are you gorgeous?”

This is asking the recipient to justify how he or she is gorgeous.

“How are you, gorgeous?”

This is asking the recipient how he or she is feeling or doing AND is referring to him or her as gorgeous.

Conclusion

If you want to offend a friend or relative who knows that a comma means a pause, then send a “How are you gorgeous?” text message to him or her.

If you want to compliment someone about his or her looks while asking about his or her well-being, then send a “How are you, gorgeous?” text message.

“ink jet” vs. “ink-jet” vs. “inkjet”

Adjectives, Hyphens, Nouns, Versus

Reader Jennifer W. recently contacted me with this question:

Could you look into the proper spelling of the term inkjet? I see it spelled 3 ways: ink jet, ink-jet and inkjet. There are differences between various dictionaries as well. How do I know which is correct?

Here was my response:

Jennifer,

Thanks for contacting me. It’s an excellent question!

If you are referring to an individual jet built into a printer, then “ink jet” would be correct. For example: “An ink jet in the printer became clogged with ink residue.”

But you should never use “ink jet” to modify a noun (such as “printer”). When you use two nouns together to modify a third noun, you must hyphenate the first two nouns. Otherwise, for example, you leave the reader wondering whether “ink jet printer” refers to a printer that uses one or more ink jets OR to a “jet printer” (whatever that is!) that uses ink (versus, say, toner(s) or color stick(s)).

This leads to the question about when to use ink-jet and when to use inkjet.

You may not like the answer, but in my opinion the answer is that you may use either one.

It depends on whether you prefer hyphenated or non-hyphenated compound nouns.

The German language is full of non-hyphenated compound nouns.

In contrast, British English is full of hyphenated compound nouns.

My impression is that many Americans prefer the German approach, and this approach is fine when combining ink and jet.

Omitting the hyphen does not always work, though. For example, “pen-island” can easily be misinterpreted when you omit the hyphen!

But, again, the non-hyphenated “inkjet” form is just as clear as the hyphenated “ink-jet” form.

And it seems to me that many people now prefer “inkjet” over “ink-jet” when you are omitting the word “printer” from your sentence — as in, “My inkjet died last week.” (or “Do you have any inkjets for less than $100?”).

…

Best,
Kirk

One suggestion: Buy my How to Use Hyphens book. It will help you further with questions like this.