The debates which has been ongoing for a number of years on how to write the word “esports” has finally come to a close as the Associated Press concluded the debate on how the word should be written and classified. During a debate at the American Copy Editors Society yesterday, the Associated Press put it to bed, and we’re moving forward from here.
The AP editors: "Some decisions were easy. But 'esports' wasn't one of them." #ACES2017 pic.twitter.com/JFSYD2hSlo
— Mededitor (@Mededitor) March 24, 2017
@ben_silverman Because of industry trends and general usage, esports joins email as exceptions to our general e-word rule to use a hyphen.
— Lou Kesten (@lkesten) March 24, 2017
I was perhaps one of the biggest culprits of using “eSports” throughout my years of pretending to be a journalist, and it wasn’t until a saw a Tweet from a professional CS:GO analyst remarking “we don’t say eMail? Why do we say eSports?” This was a glass shattering moment for me and from that day I’ve tried to use the new “esports” in an effort to set the local trend. There are of course a few exceptions to the word. You can capitilize the “E” for “Esports” if it’s in a title or used as a proper noun, eg. Energy Esports, not Energy eSports (as it once was). That’s a slippery slope because esports is not a proper noun, but can be used as one. It’s a noun, so like email, we don’t capitalize the “E” unless as shown above.
The debate was concluded solely due to global trends and the word becoming more and more prevalent in main stream media, and pretty much all press around the world. The Associated Press Stylebook will be coming out on May 31st and in there will be esports alongside email as an unhyphenated word set for an up to date hip future of press.
This is final, now. I don’t want to see any eSports around on the Twitters and Facebooks, or you’ll be getting an angry eMail from me.
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Last Updated: March 27, 2017
Craig "CrAiGiSh" Dodd
March 27, 2017 at 16:04
#eSports … :3
Alien Emperor Trevor
March 27, 2017 at 16:04
Is ehsports still okay?
Gavin Mannion
March 27, 2017 at 16:06
not sure what I’m more upset about
1. This article showing how slow a news day it is
2. AP even giving a shit about this
3. it’s eSports not esports…
Original Heretic
March 27, 2017 at 16:13
Amazing. Take away a capital letter and suddenly, it seems a whole lot more African in tone.
Captain JJ
March 27, 2017 at 16:16
Oh, cool. Because I was thinking about making a movie series called Star Wars. But I guess if I call it star wars it should be okay.
For the Emperor!
March 27, 2017 at 17:46
eSports eSports eSports eSports eSports eSports eSports eSports eSports 😛
HvR
March 27, 2017 at 21:48
*esport *esport *esport *esport *esport *esport *esport *esport *esport
Skittle
March 28, 2017 at 07:15
Gif not jif