Grammar Moses: Please absorb this monograph with zeal

Dear product salesperson: Please string together words and phrases that make sense - or don't bother emailing me.

As you might guess, those who are unfamiliar with my newspaper see "managing editor" and figure, "This guy must have the power to move mountains."

Would that it were so.

This came over the transom from a software developer:

"What are your thoughts on leveraging the experience economy with AI personalization?"

Whaaaaaaat?

Once I realized that I was not being asked about my preferred steak sauce formulation, I took a stab at translating the question and asked a few very smart colleagues to do the same.

One responded that he receives shopping carts full of such nonsense - and he deals with software people all of the time.

One came what I suspect is close to the target: "Have you ever considered how we could use artificial intelligence to promote tourism, shopping and entertainment?"

My response mirrors what another cohort had to say:

"It is so incomprehensible that I not only have no idea what it means, but also wouldn't even try to figure it out. I'd just hit the delete key and move on about my day."

That, dear salesperson and anyone else who communicates regularly, is the message.

Don't make people work to figure out what you're trying to say. That's merely an impediment to a sale. Pitch us with words ordinary people understand. We are not impressed by your mastery of the latest jargon.

My jargony headline, by they way, asks you to please enjoy my column.

Misplaced 'cannot'

A radio ad for a product commits the venial sin of telling listeners a product "cannot" do something.

Said product "cannot only change the way you look ... but way you feel about yourself."

I know this product and have seen what it can do to change a person's looks, demeanor and confidence in seeking companionship. My gripe is not with the product but with the foolish way it's being marketed.

Advertising is about telling consumers all the great things a product can do ... and perhaps implying it can do a little more. Good advertising never limits the product, and "cannot" always does that. Especially when it is misplaced in a sentence.

In the case of this message, one might interpret the sentence to mean "it can change neither your looks nor your feelings." Talk about a double whammy.

However, there is an easy fix.

Said product "can change not only the way you look but also the way you feel about yourself."

Enough of 'of'

Reader Ted "The Dictionary Man" Utchen has complained about the rampant use of "of."

His real-life example: "He'd already jumped off of the building."

"Nope," Ted wrote. "It would have been better if it had just read, 'He'd already jumped off the building.' However, if I'm in a grocery store looking at a pile of apple pies, it would be fine to say, 'Yes, I'd like to buy two of those.'"

Ted's two examples are very different. In the first, the "of" is unnecessary. Consider it this way: Would you say you jump "on of" the tollway? Golly, I hope not. Then why would you jump "off of" a bridge?

The "of" is unnecessary, yet is popular in speech in some circles. Where it is decidedly unpopular, however, is in formal writing. Google's examination of word and phrase usage in books notes the phrase "jump off a bridge" appears 275 times as often as "jump off of a bridge."

That statistic is from 2000, and I doubt the "off of" construction has gained enough steam to be a player in this argument.

In Ted's second example, which describes the number of things, "of" is necessary to link two nouns: two of those; three of your friends, a couple of pies.

But when you're using a comparative, such as fewer or more, you drop the "of." Unless there is a modifier before the noun, as in: "I'd like to meet more of your friends."

Write carefully!

• Jim Baumann is vice president/managing editor of the Daily Herald. Write him at jbaumann@dailyherald.com. Put Grammar Moses in the subject line. You also can friend or follow Jim at facebook.com/baumannjim.