Does WhiteSmoke Use Its Own Product?

WhiteSmoke is a company that claims its software can check your grammar and spelling and enrich your writing. If the writing on WhiteSmoke's website was passed through its own software, then all I can say is stay far away from the software.

Today, WhiteSmoke sent me an e-mail saying:
Limited Time Offer!
BUY ONCE GET TWICE
OFFER END MAY-7-07

That's right. I couldn't believe my eyes either.

Ahem, guys... Shouldn't that be BUY ONE, GET TWO or BUY ONE, GET ONE FREE?

And don't you mean offer ends May-7-07? I suppose you could claim that it's short for "The offer end is on May-7-07." Perhaps. But, dear reader, is that what went through your head the first time you read it?

You might think that I'm being too hard on the company and that if one poor soul messed up once, it's no big deal.

Unfortunately, this is not a one-time occurrence. WhiteSmoke is a serial offender. This kind of thing is rife on their website.

Here's another example from their forum. Under the heading Top Expert, they write, "Use credits to ask questions to top experts about English and grammar." Just for your information ladies and gentlemen of WhiteSmoke, one asks questions of someone; one poses questions to someone.

In 2006, WhiteSmoke sent me another ad in which there were two sentences. The first one started with a capital letter but was missing a period. The second sentence had a period but didn't start with a capital letter.

This company's English is sloppy. I can only come to one of two conclusions. Either their product is not doing its job, or their product is so difficult or cumbersome to use that they don't use it themselves. Either way, WhiteSmoke doesn't deserve you as their customers.