Shoulda Spelled My Beans

News misprinted



Note: As of 2020, we’ve put Shoulda Spelled My Beans, minus its formatting, back in its big, sturdy bag as a kind of burlap time capsule of late 2010s web whoopsies. Enjoy the fin-de-decade faux-pas for what they were, excuse our French roast, and vive les années vingt.



As part of our overall blog, “Shoulda Spelled My Beans” is a little grove of links (usually) pointing you to great stories on intriguing topics that just happen to have teeny, tiny typos, spelling slips, grammar gaffes or punctuation peccadillos that caught our eye. Slips that maybe, just maybe, a few games of Spell the Beans might have helped prevent.

First and foremost, we focus on the value of the journalism, with the minor mistakes simply a convenient common gateway to them. As well, we make no claims as to any benefit of playing the game. If there is any effect, it’s probably just as likely to pop up in some other area of your life as spelling itself, but we present this as a meta sort of way to make the site just a little relevant to ongoing events and conversation.

We’ll show the 25 most recent posts here, with the most recent at the top. See the full listing here, and of course there’s the whole blog including news about the app’s development, design, and gameplay. Be sure to check out all the great storytelling out there, and don’t sweat the small stuff!



Addition by subtraction
Now you C it, now you don’t.

It’s two for one time
The good news: It’s getting rarer to spot. Really.

More than necessary
That was then.

Another interplanetary misfire
Don’t you hate when that happens?

Says who?
In space, no one can hear you… No, not going there.

Not to be, or to be
We issue a very passive warning.

Getting possessive about chips
Sometimes it’s best to check one more time.

100 out of 104 ain’t bad
These formidable villains include an awol possessive apostrophe trained in character assassination, a balloon lacking oxygen, and one too few toos.

Has this 20th century icon’s brand awareness fallen this far?
Someone get Kojak on the case. Or even Kolchak.

Quick-thinking cow nabs suspect, preposition still at large
Now if some agile goat could just track down the fugitive preposition.

Robot hat trick
Or do all these bot stories just mean the Singularity is here?

Another robot writeup red-penner
Read about LEMUR-3, Ice Worm, RoboSimian, and micro-climbers, all inspired by nature.

You can’t hide this monster mistake
It actually looked pretty Scottish. We could almost hear the brogue.

An indefinite article
Is it Giotto or Mr. Robotto?

1 know what you did last night
I spy.

Signs of desire to communicate, though barriers to verbal agreement exist
The grammar police catch a police grammar misdemeanor.

Missing the mark
Living lives of quiet perspiration.

A funny thing happened on the way
We audition for an editing job.