Marvel's problem with NEXT MEN, they said, was that it sounded like X-MEN and people asking for the latter would possibly be given the former. I pointed out that the reverse was much more likely (especially given the snotty attitudes of some retailers), and that, in any case, the actual title was JOHN BYRNE'S NEXT MEN.

Woww..... back in the pre-internet days when I didn't really pay much attention to the political atmosphere or manipulations of the companies and one had to be interested enough to actually seek out "behind-the-scenes" manuveurings......

Dispite all of that, I still heard about Marvel's move against the Next Men book and my immediate response to a buddy was, "You've got to be f%$@ing kidding."

Has anyone ever noticed how many spell checkers never seem to recognize the proper versions and almost always offer up the improper ones as corrections?

I type "Spider-Man" and the typical spell checker picks it up and wants to change it to "Spiderman" yet when I type "Supergirl" the two "corrections" the spell checker gives me are "Super-Girl" and "Super Girl".  Yeesh!

I did notice that the some spell checkers DO recognize Spider-Man. There's hope yet.

Speaking a bit of our own names.  I get mine spelled "Stephen Meyers" a lot.  Easy to pronounce, with wayyyy too many spelling variations.  There's even one woman I work with who still calls me "Mr Myer", despite my name being on the door (and in other places).  And she should know, after I corrected her for correcting a student who called me "Mr Myers".  But I've given up and I let it go.

"Steven Myers" is spelled like it sounds.
"Stephen Meyers" is the weird spelling.

And yes, I'd expect comic book readers to know it is "Spider-Man".  I'd accept "Spidey" in the proper context.  I think "The Batman" or "Batman" is the writer's choice, but never "Bats"...maybe "Sir" though.

I also expect comic fans to know Plastic Man is not a member of the Fantastic Four.  And neither is "Mrs F".

Brandon - obviously there aren't enough geeks in the computer business to correct such oversights. The government needs to start providing nerd subsidies for jobs in the computer tech industry.

Hopefully the U.S. Congress and Canadian Parliament can pass the International Poindexter Accord without partisan politics and special interest groups getting in the way.

A few KA-BOOMS, an occasional Jor-El, a couple of Skrulls, Kree, and a Mxyzptlk, and the poor wee program is begging for mercy.

Darragh, you seem to have a wealth of information related to names and things Irish, any advice or resources you could point me to so I could research my last name(Mokler)?  My aunt's husband, a long while back, did an amateur genealogy research of the name that went back to the late 1800's but I was hoping to find more. 

My own Sean/Shawn moment from the past was "Jose".  I still remember how much more sense and fluidity the term "No way, Jose" made after I learned it is pronounce "Ho-zay" and not "Jose".