But, nope:
The suggested running head should be less than 80 characters (including spaces) and should comprise the article title or an abbreviated version thereof. For office purposes, the title page should include...
Found this today in the author guidelines for a medical research paper I am submitting for publication. Guess I'll have to just suck up the pride and submit it to this obviously-mediocre journal anyway. That's my job.
I have no idea where this is, but I SO want to shop here...
What's wrong with this?
ReplyDeleteThe suggested running head is a singular noun. The 80 characters is also a singular value in measurement of that singular noun. In this instance, less than is the correct form.
Basic rule is that if you can count it, use fewer. Whilst there are many characters, I count only the one running head. So there must be fewer than 80 characters in the head, but the head must be less than 80 characters long, you see.
Besides, King Alfred decided it was 'less than' in 880-odd, whilst Baker in 1770 merely offered the opinion that 'fewer than' seemed more elegant but does acknowledge common contrary usage of 'less than'.