Source: https://front-end.social/@fox/110846484782705013
Text in the screenshot from Grammarly says:
We develop data sets to train our algorithms so that we can improve the services we provide to customers like you. We have devoted significant time and resources to developing methods to ensure that these data sets are anonymized and de-identified.
To develop these data sets, we sample snippets of text at random, disassociate them from a user’s account, and then use a variety of different methods to strip the text of identifying information (such as identifiers, contact details, addresses, etc.). Only then do we use the snippets to train our algorithms-and the original text is deleted. In other words, we don’t store any text in a manner that can be associated with your account or used to identify you or anyone else.
We currently offer a feature that permits customers to opt out of this use for Grammarly Business teams of 500 users or more. Please let me know if you might be interested in a license of this size, and I’II forward your request to the corresponding team.
It still isn’t clear why anyone uses a product developed by non-native speakers to check their writing. For anyone who knows grammar, Grammarly sometimes makes… interesting… suggestions.
Grammarly seems optimized to make the user sound smart, not necessarily to make them type flawless English. Only spam bots, AI, and nitpickers write out perfect English all the time.
Email spam usually has heavily flawed English.
I’ve heard that this is intentional. It would be a waste of the spammer’s time to be contacted by people who are smart enough to not be fooled. Those smart people won’t bother contacting the spammer and wasting the spammer’s time if they see grammatical errors in a message that purports to be from a reputable organization, so the spammer throws in some errors to make the smart people filter themselves out. Or so the theory goes.
It’s a common theory.
That’s not the only spam out there, though. The real dangerous email is the phishing spam that’s written to convince the CEO or CFO to send money to the wrong account. You can’t go all Nigerian Prince if you want to steal the big bucks from companies.
Marketing spam is also often grammatically correct.
I’ve seen this filtering hypothesis, and it seems plausible. OTOH, it also gives James Veitch some fantastic material for his comedy routine.
Certain uni composition students had better learn to write flawless English if they expect to earn their desired grade in my courses.
For sure, but they won’t practice their perfect paper English outside of your courses. The PDFs they submit will be (mostly) correct, but I doubt they’ll put as much effort into their emails, let alone emails to anyone else. It’s not like customer support will correct you on your they’re/their/there/deer mistakes.
Maybe customer support should take a stronger stance on understanding and being understood using standard dialect. At least the CSRs that I usually seem to talk with could use a good basic communication course.
Students will use what they learn from me more than you think if they want a degree. If they don’t want one… well, we have several excellent nearby trade schools where they can learn a skill that won’t require formal standard English and will make them a whole lot more money in the long run (I’m honestly saying this respectfully).