Who Checks the Spell-Checkers?

On April 30, 2007, with all the usual fanfare that accompanies a software update, Microsoft (MSFT) added Barack and Obama to Office’s dictionary. It was a fairly quick canonization for the Illinois senator. His surname had been on Microsoft’s candidate list for new words since Jan. 5 of that year, and his first name followed three days later, in the same recruiting class as Zune, Klum, and Friendster. Three months later, it was official–no longer would Microsoft suggest Boatman as a replacement for the future president’s last name.

Of course, by April 2007, Obama was already a figure of some renown. He’d announced his bid for the Democratic nomination in mid-January and had been an object of intense fascination since his July 2004 speech at the Democratic Convention. But escaping the shackles of Microsoft Word’s red corrugated line is no small feat, and the list of those who’ve made the cut can seem arbitrary: Why does it recognize the surnames of Matthew Broderick and Susan Sarandon but trip over DiCaprio and Blanchett?

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