Editing 1429: Data

{{comic
| number    = 1429
| date      = October 3, 2014
| title     = Data
| image     = data.png
| titletext = If you want to have more fun at the expense of language pedants, try developing an hypercorrection habit.
}}

==Explanation==

"Kirk vs. Picard" is a debate that many ''{{w|Star Trek}}'' fans engage in- specifically which was a better captain of the {{w|Starship Enterprise|starship ''Enterprise''}} on the TV show. Captain {{w|James T. Kirk}} and {{w|Jean-Luc Picard}} each were captains of the ship (Kirk was captain of USS ''Enterprise'' (NCC-1701) and USS ''Enterprise''-A (NCC-1701-A) in {{w|Star Trek: The Original Series|The Original Series}}, while Picard was captain of USS ''Enterprise''-D (NCC-1701-D) in ''{{w|Star Trek: The Next Generation|The Next Generation}})'', but fans argue over who was the "best". Most third-place candidates are pretty distant and a more multi-faceted debate. Cueball seems to be looking at results of polling for this ''third'' most popular character.

The humor in this comic stems from the fact that the Latin word "data" is a plural form of the word "datum". Due to very few uses for the singular form and general lack of knowledge of Latin among modern population, many people do not think about it and assume "data" to be singular. Under the overwhelming dominance of this misconception, referring to data as singular is becoming increasingly (but not universally) accepted as grammatically correct - the Wall Street Journal, for instance, recently announced that it is moving away from saying data 'are', while New York Times manual of style allows for both variants depending on usage scenario, and USA Today is consistently using "data" as a plural ("data are"). Naturally, the purists insist on the form that is correct from the Latin grammar point of view and see "data is" as an example of a subject-verb agreement error. This type of error is present in the beginning of the sentence that Cueball is citing ("According to this polling data", while grammatically correct variant would be "According to these polling data").

The second error in the same sentence is due to the fact that ''{{w|Data (Star Trek)|Data}}'' is a character from <i>Star Trek: The Next Generation</i>. Since it is a character's name, when used to refer to the character, "Data" should be treated as singular.

By reversing the verb agreement in both cases, you are basically going out of your way to annoy any grammatically obsessed people.

A third grammatical error in the comic is the disagreement between the word "character" and "are" before the character name "Data".
Consider for example the correct sentence "Matter is many atoms." vs. the incorrect sentence "Matter are many atoms."

The title text suggests the mocking of language pedants/amateur {{w|Grammar Nazi|grammar Nazis}} by {{w|Hypercorrection|hyper-correcting}} your use of language. The example given is "an hypercorrection habit", following from 'an honour' (/ˈɒnəɹ/) and 'an hour' (/ˈaʊəɹ/) in English. These two are correct as they are French derived, and so the 'h' is silent and the words start with a vowel sound, thus leading to the use of 'an'. The word "hyper-correction" (/ˌhaɪ.pəɹ.kəˈɹɛk.ʃən/) starts with a standard consonant 'h' sound and so must be preceded with 'a', not 'an'. Contrast 'an umbrella' and 'a uniform'. This comic also complements [[326: Effect an Effect]], which discusses the trolling of amateur grammar Nazis.

This comic also appears to be an example of {{w|Self-irony|self-irony}} as the author himself has previously exhibited certain inclination to insist on grammatically strict mode of usage of words loaned from Latin. One such example is the fact that [http://fora.xkcd.com/ xkcd's online discussion forums] are called ''fora'' (which is a correct plural nominative form of ''forum'' in Latin)

==Transcript==
:[Cueball reading off a smart phone to someone off the panel]
:Cueball: According to this polling data, after Kirk and Picard, the most popular <em>Star Trek</em> character are Data.
:Off-panel character: <em>Augh!</em>
:Annoy grammar pedants on all sides by making "data" singular <em>except</em> when referring to the android.

{{comic discussion}}