Aha, A Novel And Unusual Use Of The Word "Every"

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This from an Air NZ email that flopped into my InBox just now:
... every Air New Zealand Flight* can earn you Status Points ...

Sounds good, no? But what about that little asterisk, how does Air NZ mean by "every":
*Flights paid for with Airpoints Dollars and travel industry tickets, prize competition tickets, free tickets and tickets purchased using Fly Buys points cannot earn Status Points.

Oh.
So a lot of tickets, in fact probably most tickets, punters would buy are covered by this "exciting new scheme" ... but not "every". Why didn't they just say "most" or "nearly all" or even "everyday".

My point? Sticking a bloody asterisk on a word does not mean you can lie*

* Posts with a humour element and those written by a human cannot be held to be truthful

Comments

  1. AnonymousNovember 06, 2008 5:01 pm

    Notice also they say "can", not "will".

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mike RiversdaleNovember 06, 2008 5:19 pm

    After reading Stephen Fry's latest blog posting I'm feeling a little churlish about writing this, *ahem*

    ReplyDelete

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