"Real World" Grammar

After looking at the "real world" grammar examples, it seems to me that there are cases of both intentional and unintentional misuse of the commas, semicolons and colons.

In the Jack and Coke add, the writer used a comma where a new thought was taking place. A semicolon or period would have been more grammatically correct. Whoever wrote up the Cabela's add got comma happy separating dates and locations. Separating them that way makes the sentence choppy and confusing. A re-phrasing of ideas, such as breaking it down to "May 17-28 Only" like they do on other adds would have been more effective. The Training table add also overuses its commas. In this case however, it seems to emphasize each condiment, forcing the reader to linger on individual parts of the sandwich and therefore seems like a more intentional mistake than the other two comma examples.

The earn while you learn add misuses the semicolon as it breaks up one complete thought into two fragments. The writer for this add may have been attempting to break up the thought to make it easy to remember, or may not have known they were breaking a complete thought and wanted to emphasize each half of the sentence separately.

Marie Calendar's add would have used that colon correctly if they'd have stuck to the list they were making. However because they added another clause to the end, the colon should have been a comma; the list would serve as a break in the clause.