Search engines are funny animals, and because of the way they literally interpret every search query exactly as it was entered by the user, tens of thousands of people end up searching for misspelled key phrases such as “Porn Pay Per Veiw”. While I’m tempted to write this off as the lazy side effect of an industry that promotes one-handed typing (you know what the other hand is used for), it seems rather obvious that people are not intentionally misspelling these phrases in a number of varieties (for example, “Porn Pay Per Viw” has a substantial number of queries as well as it’s cousins “Porn Pay Per Veiw”, “Pay Porn Veiw”, and “Pay Per Vew Porn”.
What is even more ironic, is that as the number of instances that these phrases are misspelled increases, quick thinking online marketers rush to build up linkbait articles with these phrases intentionally misspelled in order to attract higher rankings in Search Engines, and to snare a few extra hits from careless spellers who are looking for “pay porn veiw” instead of “pay porn view”.
As this phenomenon continues, and begins to follow the cyclical pattern of adoption and integration that follows most cultural/media interactions, it begs the question of what role established spelling standards play in our modern, search-driven, society. Of course it’s great if everyone agrees on a standard set of spellings for all words, but if we just start pandering to illiteracy by wavering in our journalistic integrity, doesn’t that just ultimately promote a lazy sense of spelling?
While nobody expects the adult industry to lead the charge in literacy reform in our country, it is a given fact that the adult industry leads the forefront of cutting edge online marketing strategies and adoption of new technologies. As such, it plays an important role in trendsetting, and establishing the difference between “Pay Porn Veiw” and “View” is not really too much to ask of an industry that could use a little beefing up on their writing credentials as well.
