History Main / TheBigListOfBooboosAndBlunders

** There is also "tare weight", which is the weight of an empty container or unladen vehicle, often subtracted from the gross weight of said container to find the weight of its contents (the "net weight").

** Strictly speaking "confidant" meant to be AlwaysMale and "confidante" is AlwaysMale (it's one of those weird words with a separate spelling for male and female.) That said, most people just use "confidant" for both nowadays.

* "macaroon" (an cookie whose best-known variation in the US is coconut-based and dipped in chocolate, and popular in the southern US) vs. "macaron" (a delicate French sandwich cookie).

* Creator/Confucius's name is frequently misspelled (and mispronounced). "Confusius" and "Confucious" are the most common mistakes, but sometimes you'll also see "Confusus" and worst of all "Confusion"(!). That last one is probably the result of a spell-checker's "correction".

* "shear" (to slice or cut) for "sheer" (translucent, almost transparent). "Sheer" is sometimes used in the sense of "pure" or "solid", as in "sheer force of will"; there's also a usage in the sense of a "sheer cliff face". "Shear force of will" is a meaningless phrase (although it might be turned into the name of a [[KiManipulation ki attack]] by a sufficiently clever [[strike:author]] Airbender).

* The verb "affect" (to act on, produce a change) and the noun "effect" (result, consequence) are ''not'' interchangeable. [[http://xkcd.com/326/ There actually is a rather esoteric meaning of "effect" as a verb]], however; it means "to bring about." Even worse, "affect" is also [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affect_(psychology) a technical term in psychology]] when used as a noun, making it possible to both affect an effect and effect an affect.

* "copyleft" (neologism) for "copyright" (permission to copy). Although "copyleft" is fine as an in-joke among programmers (meaning a license that allows derivative works, but only under the same licensing terms as the original), it's only a name and totally worthless when it comes to establishing or defending one's intellectual property rights—no court in the world recognizes it. Also, don't confuse "copyright" with "copywrite" (create copy, especially advertising copy).

* "Self-deprecating" ([[SelfDeprecation making fun of one's own self]]) vs "self-depreciating" (making oneself go down in value, presumably). Likely a misreading, particularily since the word "deprecate" (to show disapproval) hardly ever appears on it's own.

* While "Childish" and "Childlike" both mean "resembling a child", the connotations they have are quite distinct. Namely, childish usually means implies, immature, naive, self-centered etc, while childlike implies cute,innocent, guileless etc. People often incorrectly treat them as synonymous.

* "simplistic" is not a "fancier" way of saying simple. It means oversimplified or simple to a fault, such as [[BlackAndWhiteInsanity "He has a simplistic view of morality"]]

* UsefulNotes/ScotlandYard for the British national law enforcement, the equivalent of the American FBI. As its page indicates, Scotland Yard is the London Metropolitan Police, not their national police. The national law enforcement is known as the Security Service, sometimes called State Security and better known as MI-5.

* "baseous" vs "basic". Any ''baseous'' stuff has pH greater than 7, such as lye. Any ''basic'' stuff is trivial, elementary or fundamental.

* "adultery" means [[YourCheatingHeart sleeping with someone while married to someone else]]. "Adultry" is not a word.