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Proofreading Services

Six Windows Translations offers proofreading services exclusively for

texts written in English

Scanning texts conscientiously for mistakes of whatever nature is a special talent, and it can frequently turn into an obsession. Perfection is a commendable objective, but one that can drive an individual to distraction.

When you are a busy and rigorous proofreader, it is almost impossible to visit a website, read a book, magazine or newspaper, open a menu in a restaurant, read a simple notice or billboard, or even listen to a song without scanning for grammatical or typographical errors. Hardly a single book has ever been published that does not contain some mistake, whether major or minor, on at least one of its pages. Who notices? I do.

The need for precise proofreading of English text is universally visible - just take a look at almost any site on the worldwide web, especially (but of course not only) those from countries where English is not the native language.

A company that publishes text containing mistakes, whether on paper or on the internet, is not doing its business any favours. In fact, companies and organisations that publish "bloopers" can often find themselves the object of derision in other places - you only have to think about the masses of "humorous" hotel and restaurant signs (Link) that appear on a regular basis.

Six Windows Translations is able to bring any text written in or translated into English up to scratch, no matter what the content and format.

Additional information:

gordon.walker@gmx.net

or

ceo@gordonwalker.eu

A published text, especially within the context of advertising, must be

Free of grammatical and typographical errors
Constructed in a logical sequence
Consistent with regard to the terms and expressions used
In a uniform tone and style

Here is an example from the mercedes-benz.co.uk homepage that was found after reading the site for just a few minutes:

The first two paragraphs contain three instances of the company name in the correct form (Mercedes-Benz).

The third paragraph contains two instances of the company name in an incorrect form (Mercedes Benz).

How could this happen within such a small block of text? Surely the author must be aware of the fact that Mercedes-Benz is always written with a hyphen (as in the case of Rolls-Royce)?

Another example from a few clicks further on:

In other sections of the same site, the author has taken care to use apostrophes in such constructions as "12 month's warranty", but has simply ignored his or her own rule here.
The omission of a single letter ("on" instead of "one") diminishes the overall impression of
the copy and not a few readers will wonder whether Mercedes might tend to forget a few
small details when manufacturing cars ... not that they do, of course.

By the way, in looking for examples to include in this section, I scanned the UK and US sites of Porsche, reading pages and pages of advertising copy and hard technical specifications without finding a single mistake, not even a comma out of place. As you might expect, the people at Porsche seem well able to do their jobs - the attention to detail is immaculate.

But enough of praise ... bosch.com provides the next example of inconsistency:

Again, these examples are merely a click or two apart ... Having noticed the omitted hyphen in the adjectival usage of "first class" in the right-hand example, I ran a search in bosch.com for "first-class" and came up with the following:

Nobody really notices missing hyphens ... or do they? An incorrectly placed or omitted hyphen can subvert meaning, as shown by the following humorous examples:

high schoolgirl -> high-school girl fine tooth comb -> fine-tooth comb

a little used-car -> a little-used car cross complaint -> cross-complaint

So there you are: a good proofreader has to be pedantic, finicky, hypercritical, thorough and dogged, and this is frequently a matter of personality. At Six Windows Translations, we are proud to say we fit in with this profile.