Selling on eBay UK?

Interesting, I didn't know that. I was quite interested when we bought our house in 2006, and the legal documentation referred to "messuage". This was a word I'd never heard of, but I mentioned it to a lawyer friend, and he instantly knew what it meant.

I guess certain professions do require the use of certain language (although you'd think datum would be more common in IT)

A datum line is singular. Data is plural - lots of information, not just one item.

Over to the Latin scholars....

And if a sailor referred to 'chart data' it would be ambiguous, even though 'chart datum' is not.

'Datum' is a perfectly good word in English now, referring to a zero point, in relation to which, measurements have important meanings. Light aircraft (and FAIK, heavy ones as well) also have a datum, the distance from which the centre of gravity is defined.

Given the way languages evolve over time, 'datums' is probably the most useful form of the plural to avoid ambiguity today, even though 'data' is the Latin plural of 'datum'.

None of this changes the fact that whereas 'data' is the plural of 'datum', 'virii' is not a correct plural of 'virus', even in Latin.

I think the fact that some people say things like 'virii' rather than 'viruses' is based on the same sort of misconception that leads people to say, very commonly, "between you and I'. They've heard somewhere that "me and him went down the pub" is wrong, so they extrapolate, wrongly, and imagine that any use of the word 'me' is wrong in that sort of context.

Whereas, 'between you and me' is perfectly correct.

It probably won't be in twenty years time.

But that's probably not new's (sic) to anyone...

I have books from the middle 1800s by scholars that include spellings such as finisht, so language does indeed change over time.

'Tis verily so, methinks.

Indeed it does change. Partly this is in response to new demands - there was no need for the words "computer", "telephone", or "racism" in the days of Nelson.

But partly it's due to ignorance. The seemingly unstoppable rise of "haitch" at the expense of "aitch" is something that saddens me. It's a consequence, largely, of opening up the airwaves (and the media, generally) to people without education. At one time it was a requirement of BBC staff that they be able to read and write and know when an aitch should be silent.

Now, anything goes.

G

Hi,

Back on thread for a moment. I have a similar experience to batty. I have used evilbay for 7 years. The last 2, it has gone a lot downhill mainly for smaller private sellers, mainly because of lots of so-called improvements by ebay that in reality are NOT. They have increasingly chased the large business sellers, to the detriment of small private ones...who are the ones who made ebay what it is today lets not forget.

For the first time in ebay history the amount of listings are falling...and heavily too. The last recorded 12 month period, they fell worldwide by I think 8%..which is huge...and they continue to fall. Less sellers means less buyers...downward spiral.

The other problem is that the huge TV campaigns over the last two years largely resulted in masses of idiots and scammers coming onto ebay, messing around for a couple of months and then leaving.

The fact they own paypal and push everyone to use it is also losing sellers. They just ban any competition and paypal leaves it's doors wide open for scammers and fraudsters to scam honest sellers, who are often totally unprotected by paypal and end up losing money.

An increasing amount of dis-enchanted ex ebay sellers are now leaving to set up their own little selling websites and using the new google checkout (banned by ebay) to take payments.

things just aint like they use to be......

cheers Steve.M.