Today, in my RSS feed reader, I saw the following item from the Atlanta Business Chronicle: Delta wants Columbia expansion Delta Air Lines Inc. has asked the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) to OK new routes to Columbia. I thought, "How nice, they'll be expanding the airport in Columbia, South Carolina." The RSS feed only provided the above teaser, so I went to the full article. It turns out that Delta wants to add more routes to Colombia, the country in South America, not Columbia, the city in South Carolina. The link to the article is here, but they may correct the error by the time you read this. Is it my imagination, or do we, as professionals, pay less attention to spelling than we used to even 5 or 10 years ago? In the last few years around Atlanta, I have seen some nasty spelling mistakes on signs and advertisements. Some of the best (worst) ones:

• "SIDEWALK ARE COMING" - City of Atlanta roadside sign during the construction of the Huff Road sidewalk
• "The Epitomy of Modern Living" - outside an apartment building at Atlantic Station
• "Bluegrass Vally Road" - in Forsyth County (fortunately they replaced that sign with a correctly-spelled one)
• "Slay bed" - featured in a furniture store advertisement published in a free weekly newspaper

When I see errors like these, it lowers my respect for the organization that publishes them. How can they allow such errors to go unchecked? Maybe I'm "old school," but I'm sure I am not the only one bothered by this. To everyone out there: your spelling makes a difference to somebody, even if it is just a small fraction of your audience. But that small fraction counts! Don't lose them: be attentive to your spelling.