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Redblueflare,
No, I don't think the "grammar thing" is a bit harsh at all. Many people in this country write well. Many of us also expect that by the time something is published, it will have been edited for spelling and grammar; in other words, it will have a professional appearance. Unfortunately, when something is published repeatedly with poor grammar or spelling, people have a tendency to assume that that is the correct way to do it, and modify their own communication accordingly. For instance, there's a real trend at least in spoken English to drop the "ly" suffix off of adverbs. No big deal, eh? With each such mistake, however, we gradually lose more and more of our command of our own language.
As much as I've been tempted, I've never emailed a person to tell them how poorly their online signature is written (along with the rest of their entries), although I did once (helpfully, I hope) let someone know that a biblical reference was misspelled. I will gladly admit there are two people who post on certain boards around here whose writing is so horrific I cannot read it, and these are, to my knowledge, writing in their native language. I will also admit that while primarily a computer game is a shambles if it's released before it is capable of performing properly, I also believe that it is unprofessional to release it with copious grammatical and spelling mistakes. I love Wizards & Warriors, but that has to be one of the most poorly worded games I've ever seen (one character describes a colanth's eye as being "mesermizing"). It's just unprofessional.
Oh, and I rarely use "spell check" programs. They're often wrong. Rely on a decent dictionary, instead.
By the way, your writing is generally well done, so no need to take any of this personally! But feel free to email me if you'd like to get into further conversation on this.
AliCat
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