James wrote to Steve:
Thank you, you’re awesome.
I lost my girlfriend on April 23, 2008 from melanoma which spread rapidly to her liver, 48 hours after we found out it spread to her liver she sadly passed away….she was only 24 and I think about her every day. I am so grateful you took time out to do this. My girlfriend and I are from Cupertino, since childhood, and it’s really nice to see the hometown hero take time out to do this.
Once again, thank you so much.
Sincerely,
James
A few hours later, Steve wrote back:
Your [sic] most welcome, James. I’m sorry about your girlfriend. Life is fragile.
Steve
Sent from my iPad
Frommer reports, “After reviewing the header information, we believe this email is indeed from Steve. But there’s always the possibility that it’s not.”
More details in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: That incorrect “your” certainly does stick out like a sore thumb. Frommer also mentions it in his full article.
iPad auto-correction doesn’t fix your, since it’s a common word. But Jobs doesn’t have time for correct grammer — it’s amazing he’d take time to respond at all! Anyone get a personal response from Ballmer?
Your welcome was his answer to Steve.
“Anyone get a personal response from Ballmer?”
I ducked a flying chair once.
I got a personal response from Ballmer every time I have to use a Microsoft product.
Life sure is fragile.
If Steve really did write “your” it makes me sad…
@January 24, 1984
ROTFALMAO
I can’t forgivce Steve forsuch a stuopid typing eorrer.
@C1
LOL.
‘Life is fragile’
…and precious.
your is grammatically correct. you’re denotes you are. What’s the problem?
made you look didn’t I?
spatlantean,
It should be “you’re” as in “you are welcome.”
“Your welcome” would mean ownership of welcome. The welcome that is yours, which is obviously incorrect.
Life is fragile, AND short.
Too short to fret over spelling errors, especially someone else’s spelling errors.
If all you can see is the spelling error when you read Steve’s sincere reply, maybe it’s time to close your browser and go live life a little more fully…
@Deus Ex Technica
Amen to that.
I wonder why he didn’t insert [sic] in his quoted e-mail?
“My girlfriend and I are from Cupertino, since childhood,[sic] and it’s really nice to see the hometown hero take time out to do this.”
Did he think Steve might have thought he was from Cupertino now, but wasn’t from Cupertino as a child?
Just wonderin [sic]
Haha. Good point, Deus Ex Technica,
Steve’s exchange was touching and not lost to me. But grammar, too, needs a champion! A noble spirit to preserve our language and all its splendor. (cough cough) I’ve said enough today…
@Deus Ex Technica
Absolutely.
As far as I’m concerned it IS that guy’s welcome now…
If you are reading this sitting down, stand up, take a deep breath,
focus on the fact that you are alive and have the incredible good fortune (billions of people do not) to be
1. Living in a world and at a time when Steve is around and working to make things better
2. Able to appreciate it.
@PR
on it…
Live every day (as if it’s your last);
Wake up tomorrow and ask not if you’re ready to face the world but is the world ready for you!
As ruler of the world, Steve can spell “you’re” however he damn well likes! Besides, I work at a newspaper (remember them?) and our deputy editor once made the same mistake.
But it does irk me that iPhone autocorrect insists on changing “its” to “it’s”. Makes it harder to win that battle.
There/their/they’re is another common source of confusion.
Oh, and I’m glad Steve lived to see Apple take over the world. I’ve emailed him to that effect in the past but never heard back.
We’re here for a good time, not a long time.
I find ‘James’ to be un-cool. One shares such an e-mail with their wife, perhaps; not with the whole damned world.
To the grammar police out there, get a life! (that goes for MDN as well)
It’s just a note for God’s sake.
One from the heart, but still just a note.
@Connor MacBook,
The ones that really get to me are the missed contractions involving “have” where the writer substitutes “of”, i.e. “should of” instead of the correct “should’ve”. I’m seeing these more and more all over the Web, and I haven’t (nor will I ever) get used to it.
At Connor MacBook,
It irk’s me that the iPhone OS always want’s to change “as” to “A’s”
Time for an update.
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And now, <u>Special Thoughts</u> from Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer (after throwing a chair across a conference room, where it crashed into a desk):
“I’m going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I’m going to f***ing kill Google.”
Thank you Mr. Ballmer (*sniff*) I think I might stare at my wife now, all teary-eyed.
@The Other Steve
You really need to take MDN more seriously, in particular the comments section. Only verbiage suitable for peer reviewed scientific publications is accepted here.
For example, I learned today that “you’re” stand for “you are”. I will not know for sure until I google it, but if that is true, my life has been forever altered by today’s comments section.
You’re just aint gettin that anywere else, The Other Steve.
In a freak chance of coincidence, my wife’s parents both went into kidney failure within a short time of each other.
They were both on dialysis at the same time!
Three years ago, on my wife’s birthday, she gave her mother a kidney.
One year later, during the week of her next birthday, I gave a kidney to her dad!
We are both in perfect health, and have suffered nothing as a result.
An absolutely ridiculous spelling error. Unbelievable.
The iPhone will autocorrect “youre” to “you’re” so you can just type the e at the end and let the phone put in the apostrophe for you.
January 24, 1984,
I am sorry for Jame´s girlfriend. I hope she is with my Jenny.
Thank God Steve is good and alive and taking time to help organ donations. We will not use our organs once we pass away but we can give life to someone.
Steve rocks!
‘Life is …’
… precious.
Kevin J. Weise & The Other Steve,
I’m with youse there!
@ spatlantean
LOVE your humor! Is “earthlingdave” your straight man? Or, perhaps it’s so good I should wonder if you’re him?
[sic] is proper journalism procedure it shows that MDN has some creed. I cringe when I see posts interchanging there, their and they’re without a clue as to which one they should be using – most idiots have no idea what those three words mean. No wonder the British hate us for what we are doing to their language.
The continuous misuse of the words your and you’re, as well as its and it’s, makes me wonder just how far behind China and most educated countries we are. This is not something you learn getting your M.A. in college- it’s elementary, my dear Watson.
I’ve been correcting the moderator of a well-known and successful vocalist networking website, and rather than correct himself or God forbid, learn some grammar, he simply accepts the fact that he is “spelling-challenged.”
You lose credibility in my book- says a lot about your attention to detail, ability to learn, intellectual curiosity.
I can’t believe Jobs wrote that- maybe he dictated it.
It could simply be a typo. Nothing more, nothing less.
[sic] bastards worrying about that sh*t.
Reed college ejecation
I worked for a paper once and my colleague did a front page advert for a client:
Wirral Grammer School
He was fired the next day…
As a melanoma survivor, I empathize with James. It is one of the scariest forms of metastatic cancer.
May peace be with him.
It’s a freakin’ typo, get over it. I make the same mistake when on my iPhone, especially on Twitter. iPad has a bigger keyboard but still prone to same mistakes, especially if it’s late at night or early in the morning.
Nice to know there are so many perfect people with working fingers out there.
As for Steve’s note, a very nice gesture. My husband is a testicular cancer survivor, and I just lost my father-in-law to complications of dementia, so I know how fragile (and precious) life is. Cherish your loved ones, folks — you may never get another chance.
He almost certainly has an assistant handling these responses for him.
Just because Steve uses your here doesn’t give away he’s not Steve.
I’m a correct grammar kind of person and miss it sometimes, and it surprises me when I catch it.
@zmarc, “But Jobs doesn’t have time for correct grammer — “
You don’t either, for spelling.
I don’t see any incorrect use of Steve’s use of ‘your’… It is used correctly – you’re would have been wrong as it means you are – his use meant possession (your girlfriend)
John Gee:
Just because Steve uses your here doesn’t give away he’s not Steve.
I’m a correct grammar kind of person and miss it sometimes, and it surprises me when I catch it.
Oh, really? :/
@ Shawnvp–
Uh… No. Read it again.
“Your welcome.”
Oooops – figures I didn’t read it all, sorry…. Guess I get touchy when people critique Mr. Jobs
Fragile – must be Italian.
‘Life is …’
… precious.
Don’t go where?
Tt,
Hmm. For a moment there, you looked precariously close to a synthetic-oil treated, anodized aluminum, slope.
The kind that might slide — down, down, down — five or six pages.
But, “re-direction” helped you sidestep that. Clever boy.
Grammar and spelling are important. The purpose of language is to communicate one’s meaning to another as accurately and meaningfully as possible. As we cannot read each ither’s minds, language has to fulfill the role of representing our thoughts.
Although the word ‘your’ in the email does not affect the meaning that much, English speakers are notorious for splitting infinitives, misusing prepositions, spelling words incorrectly.
The reason why this is bad is not the breaking of the rules per se. It is because the errors detract from the meaning, make the meaning more difficult to understand, and reduce the force of what is being said.
– others not ithers.
This discussion is timely for me as I’m teaching MLA citation to some students right now. Writing as communication has to have rules the same way writing music or writing a mathematical equation has to have rules. It has to work, and everyone who reads it has to understand it. So spelling and grammar and mechanics rules matter.
Having said that, I feel that unless one is writing for a formal purpose, such as a research paper or a publication, why sweat the details? Everyone who read that email understood its meaning, correct? I see license plates all the time with truncated words and phrases that still have meaning like the one I used to have, “hrdrck.” I work to make my writing as accurate as possible because I’m in education, and it’s important to me. Even when I text, I don’t use truncation or abbreviations, because it goes against my nature. But I don’t expect others to do the same.
Grammar snobs are okay as long as they are kind in their education of others. Grammar matters; civility matters, too.
“San Di…..egans?”…….”San Dieg….ites?…….”San Diegans!!!”
Gotta love Anchorman
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Slippery huh?
Yes. ‘It’ is slippery.
Sorry, I have no idea what your point is.
You’re bored.
Well, we have been talking about nothing since 2:02pm.
And, while it was interesting. It was rather allusive. How long can a person keep that up?
But, no one interupted us!
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Time to slip outta here?
I’m an organ donor, I hope all of you are also. Give to others something you will no longer need. Taking useful parts to the grave is just a waste of parts and a waste of a life.