Hi Oren, I appreciate your reply about this!
Actually, my name is Will, not William, damnit!!! :)))) But I don't think this is really the same. First, "coworking" isn't a company name or a given name / proper noun. It's not your name or my name. It's not even "the movement's" name. If "personal computing" became just "computing," what would you think if Apple or Microsoft or a handful of influential early players in the personal computing industry campaigned against the change and said that we can't change "their" name, and that it was as though their given names were being mis-spelled? I'd personally think they should leave the English language alone and that it wasn't the role of people in an industry to try to manage what have become common nouns in the English language. I have run a coworking space for more than 4 years now. I care what you call my space or what you call me and I care about coworking, but the idea that spelling coworking differently from how people who run coworking spaces think it should be spelled, or that misspelling is like misspelling a proper noun seems to me like a stretch. Second, to the extent the name is owned by the community of coworking space owners, or at least we have a meaningful stake in it (which I think we do), then who are *we*? You write that after 10 years, the coworking movement has earned it and that the "rest of us have all settled on coworking." But I don't think that's true. I see new coworking spaces all the time that put a hyphen in the term. As I wrote in the previous email, my (unsubstantiated) hypothesis is that there's really a pretty small group of coworking space owners who care about coworking being spelled without a hyphen. I've never seen poll results and I doubt the question has even been put to a wide audience of coworking space owners (and presumably members). Even within the industry I'd guess the vast majority don't care (if there were an option included in the poll), and I wouldn't be at all surprised if an international poll of coworking space owners and members showed that the majority even thought the better spelling would be WITH a hyphen. Why wouldn't you have heard that? The same reason I almost didn't make the last post in the first place: "the other side" (the side that would prefer a hyphen or just doesn't care), doesn't have a horse in the race, because for that side language is organic and functional and they don't see themselves as owning the name or as there being a meaningful difference in whether it's spelled with or without a hyphen. (To be clear, I have no idea about "the other side" or what justifications might be; I've never seen any data on this; but it also wouldn't surprise me). And the name coworking belongs to a much wider audience than just us coworking space owners by now, just as "personal computing belongs" to a much wider audience than Microsoft or Apple. And the Internet (or now internet) belongs to a much wider audience than the people who originally coined the name. That's a sign of the maturity of the word, and something to be proud of as a movement. Not something to fight against. Third, even if we were a coherent community who almost universally agreed that spelling it without a hyphen was superior, wouldn't it be good to examine the counter-arguments? If, after we all gave it some thought, we agreed that it really didn't matter and that we should let its spelling be determined organically, then wouldn't we have saved each other a lot of time working to change something that was better left to grow on its own according to systems that my be wiser than we are about naming? My few cents, anyway. Will On Fri, Sep 19, 2014 at 9:30 AM, oren.salo...@gmail.com < oren.salo...@gmail.com> wrote: > I'm with Marius on this one. > > I think the important thing here is to get us in the dictionary with the > spelling we use. > > To me, the spelling issue has always been indicative of a bigger thing, > which is official recognition as part of the English language. > > After 10 years, I think the movement has earned it. > > William, how would you feel if everyone started calling you Bill or > Will-iam? What if the difference between Will-iam and William was just in > written language and not in speech? You even stated that the reason you > spell it coworking is out of respect for the rest of us that have all > settled on coworking (you even prefer co-working!). That's all we're asking > of journalists in this case. And if they're denying our requests on the > basis of being or not being in the dictionary, then let's get in the > dictionary. > > Also Derek, the cowering autocorrect annoys me too! It never learns! > > > > > > On Wednesday, September 17, 2014 12:47:01 PM UTC-5, Marius Amado-Alves > wrote: >> >> FWIW, I agree with Will's arguments except the "cow" one. >> >> To summarize, the spelling is irrelevant, because there is only one >> coworking, irrespectively of how it is spelt. As Will points out, working >> with others in a company is never referred to as coworking. >> >> Nevertheless, I think there is interest in diccionarizing the terms. (And >> then, while we're at it, with the preferred spelling? It would be >> interesting to watch what happens to the guides.) >> > -- > Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the > Google Groups "Coworking" group. > To unsubscribe from this topic, visit > https://groups.google.com/d/topic/coworking/AyZVba1lISs/unsubscribe. > To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to > coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- Will Bennis *Like Locus-Krakovska <https://www.facebook.com/locusworkspace> on FacebookLike Locus-Slezska <https://www.facebook.com/LocusSlezska> on Facebook* *Follow Locus Workspace <http://twitter.com/locusworkspace> on Twitter* http://www.locusworkspace.cz wmben...@locusworkspace.com Mob: +420 732 501 105 -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. 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