Feb 06, 2012 admin
While Facebook received press for filing its initial public offering last week, it also generated an update in the Associated Press Stylebook.
The social networking site’s new Timeline feature, according to AP, should be written as one word and capitalized. For social-media mavens and writing enthusiasts, Facebook is written as Facebook, though often portrayed as facebook or FaceBook. Twitter also has been stylized, with retweet and unfollow securing individual entries.
In addition to social media, economics is also in the news. AP has compiled a list of key financial terms, especially as European Union leaders continue to discuss and propose reforms for the eurozone crisis.
Some interesting listings from the AP style guide:
- bailout: Financial aid for a company or nation unable to meet debt obligations.
- capital flow: When money from an investment moves from one country to another.
- credit crunch: Rising interest rates that make loans less affordable to businesses, governments or individuals.
- decision-maker, decision-making: Hyphenated in AP usage.
- default: Failure to meet financial obligations.
- downturn: A negative trend in economics or business.
- earth vs. Earth: Lowercase in most uses: down to earth; earth mother. Capitalized the name of the planet: Aliens traveled to Earth.
- embargo, sanction: A ban or restriction on trade applied to goods entering or leaving a country, often as a tool of foreign policy.
- euro, eurozone: Currency used by 17 of the 27 countries in the Europe Union, known as the eurozone.
- European debt crisis: A main topic of the 2012 World Economic Forum.
- European Union: The 27-nation community sharing laws and trade policies. The EU is based in Brussels.
- G-20: Hyphenate the abbreviated term for the Group of 20 industrial and emerging-market nations.
- hedge fund: Private investment partnerships that seek quick profits by placing large sums in currency, bond and stock markets.
- International Monetary Fund: Supply of money supported by member nations and used to stabilize international currencies and trade. IMF acceptable on second reference.
- nonprofit: One word, no hyphen.
- policymaker, policymaking: Spelled as compounds in AP Style.
- recession: Decline of economic activity that may be a temporary phenomenon or could continue into a depression.
- sovereign debt: Debt issued only by a government.
- tax cut: Two words.
- the 1 percent: Richest segment of Americans. Term popularized by Occupy Wall Street protesters who claim to speak for the other 99 percent.
For further reading, check out AP style’s common mistakes, grammatical essentials and political terms.
