This should be mandatory reading

Yea, but those are the worst. I see "Defiantly" or "definately" substituted for "definitely" way too often, especially the former. Also, the Literally one is also good at quite literally making me roll around on the floor laughing my ass off, well, it would be if I was on the floor.

Beware the Gayroller 2000 ;D

that too.

That senior comic was funny as I just graduated from high school. I do have this disagree with the Imperial vs metric system. I'm American and have used the imperial system my entire life and to me it makes more sense than the metric system. It also doesn't help that I think abstractly a lot as well as thinking literally.

For the most part, my grammar is decent. Yes, I will occasionally get words mixed up or spelled wrong, but I know how to use them or to spell them, and when I realize I've made a mistake, I feel like an idiot because I know how to write correctly.

The only time I don't use correct grammar when writing is when writing dialogue, especially with a young child. The majority of the time, I use correct grammar in dialogue, but as many people don't speak correctly, if it fits their personality to have bad grammar, I'll write it that way. Otherwise, I try to keep everything neat and in the correct tense and whatnot.

I prefer the metric system mostly. I think it makes more sense. I like rounded numbers instead of random ones and I was always taught the metric system over the imperial system, though I still measure my weight in stones and pounds and distance in miles.

I wish some writers in America (not all, just the stupid ones) would do their research on Britain properly when writing in the HP fandom. I see people even spelling Britain wrong by adding an extra 't' or spelling it Briten. Seriously? Do we spell America wrong? If you don't know whow to spell it, why not just use UK? And making the characters say things like "dude" or "Oh Em Gee". We generally don't say that stuff. Especially not in the 90's. And especially not Hermione or Snape. I've seen people have Snape say things like "Yeah, that was totally uncool". These are the people who fail at life, not just writing.

I try my hardest to write British. I've gotten called out on a few terms and the like and generally try to correct them as soon as possible.

One of the things that bothers me the most is when people write 'Mom'. I'm American and even I know it's 'Mum', which even sounds nicer.

I prefer Mum to Mom too but I might be a little biased.

One of the most basic things is Color (Am) = Colour (Br) and Favorite (Am) = Favourite (Br). We like to add 'u' to words.

Also, Meter, Center and Theater (Am) = Metre, Centre and Theatre. We like to swap 'e's and 'r's.

And the most annoying difference is Jam to Jelly to Jello.

For us the American Jello is what we call Jelly. American Jelly is what we call Jam. So when Americans say Peanut Butter and Jelly, we immediately think 'jello' and pull a face, then remember that it's American and they mean 'jam' (which makes no sense to me anyway, ew).

Hmm, maybe I should do that. I'm sure I've seen it done on a couple profiles on FFN actually. I'm not sure I'm the best person to do it though. I'd forget tons of stuff and only remember the stuff that really bugs me. Maybe I'd have to add bits to it if I find something in a fic.

Technically, we have Jell-O, jelly, and jam here in America. Jelly and jam are both used on a sandwich, but jelly is more of a spread, it doesn't have fruit chunks in it, whereas jam does have the fruit chunks. Then Jell-O is the gelatin dessert which is positively disgusting, unless it's a Jell-O jiggler which is when there is less water, hence more flavor.

There used to be a guide on fanfiction, but it's been removed. I just sent a message to the author, Pinky Brown asking if he still had it. Hopefully he does and I also asked if I could post it here.

What do you use for MALL then? I was thinking shopping centre?

Yeah we say shopping centre. It's long but...meh. Mostly we just say the name of the centre and people know what we're talking about. Like Westfields. That's the largest 'mall' in London so everyone knows where and what it is.

In America, what you are calling a "Shopping Center," I would call a "Strip Mall." Sounds dirty, doesn't it?

Just thought of something else that bugs me in HP fanfics. Dollars are NOT used in Britain! We use pounds. With this sign '£', not this one '$'.

AND, people mixing up parseltongue and parselmouth. Parseltongue is the name of the ability and language, whereas parselmouth is what you call someone who can speak parseltongue.

Also spelling that word wrong, with an extra 't', parstletongue.

Ah yes, you all brought up a lot of my pet peeves in that regard already!

Another thing that irritates me is when the characters use a MP3-player in the early 1990's or similar mistakes. Obviously, the ones who grew up with that sort of technology can't even imagine that they haven't existed 20 years ago, and don't bother to check their facts. It causes me to wince a lot when I read these stories.

Something that bugs me a lot is people's inability to understand the value of a galleon. Instead of looking it up, they'll just price things like it's about equal to $1. And then when I'm reading something, my brain will translate the prices to something 10x higher than the author really meant.