iMessage spelling error punishment

Somehow, I had the opportunity to go to the Colorado state spelling bee when I was in high school. I remember going to the auditorium and being surrounded by parents and children who had an… unhealthy obsession with pouring over prep books, doing quizzes, and practicing with parents. I’m not sure if it was ignorance or hubris, but I barely studied at all.

The initial test was a written exam, which I failed by one word. If only I’d known how to spell elixir. Ironically, a decade later my band would release a song called Elixir, and our distribution company spelled it wrong in the initial release.

I think my spelling abilities have degraded over the last decade due to a heavy reliance on autocorrect and other tools. But what if there was a way to drive greater accountability and competency through slight punishments? You could imagine iMessage restricting the use of a word when you misspell it, unless you can take a quiz to regain access faster that is.

This would be annoying if it was on by default, but the idea of a slightly smarter messaging tool, or even a tool that introduces you to new words that are outside of your vocabulary would be interesting. These emails are often rife with spelling errors, hoping I didn’t make any mistakes on this one.

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https://sorens.beehiiv.com/