Confused in cyberspace
They are going to build near my house. When I say ‘they’ of course, I don’t necessarily mean the conspirators, the ones who laugh at editorial staff.
No, this is a whole other ‘they’ – a property developer. So much for the recession. I keep hearing on the radio how badly property developers and the building trade have been hit. Well not round my gaff, they haven’t.
The local council sent me a letter inviting me to comment. It used initial capitals with wild abandon, telling me to:
“Enter the Application Number within the Application Quick Search box and select ‘Search’.”
For a moment I thought I was reading German, but then I realised that I recognised the words and none of them were ‘Achtung’ ‘Nein’ or ‘Delphine’ – the only German words I know.
It was the number of capitals that confused me.
And then the way they said ‘within’ like that… Did they expect me to get inside the Application Quick Search box and enter the application number? I decided to find out and quickly typed in the web address.
As I waited for the webpage to appear, I read more of the letter.
“From within the application details you will also be given a quick way of making representations on the application and sending them directly to us.”
Within the application details? Perhaps I would be able to get into the Quick Search box after all. And if so, no wonder it had initial caps. It was a place name, the name of a wonderland in cyberspace. I assumed that this was technology moving on without me – the technological imperative, I thought – until I looked at the page and realised my mistake. It was just an ordinary online form.