Last week, Slate.com technology writer Farhad Manjoo mustered all of his intellectual power to passionately and firmly make the case that when typing, a period that concludes a sentence should be followed by only one space, not two. The article garnered countless comments (insert my obvious envy here), which featured a sharp divide between those who agreed and those who disagreed, either thoughtfully or flippantly.
And then there were those who really went after Manjoo for even daring to write a column on the issue. Beyond the critique that the topic wasn’t important enough to warrant an article in Slate, many accused Manjoo of being a pampered brat far removed from the real world. After all, who else but a naive dilettante would devote time and energy to so inane a topic? Here are some sample quotes:
Figure out more important things like a cure for the common cold or world peace; then I’ll concern myself with whether my sentences should end with two spaces or one.
Instead of worrying about BS like this you should be grateful that geeks are willing to employ you at all. Who knows, tomorrow you might have to get an actual job.
cant wait for you folks to be in charge of my wife’s cancer. she is a breast cancer survivor from 2006. or my sons cerebral palsy. just cant wait.
Is the topic of how many spaces follow a period inane? My apologies to professional publishers and layout designers, but yes, it is absolutely an inane topic over which Manjoo 
got very worked up. But you know what else is inane? About 95% of life, and perhaps an even higher quotient of the things that people are really passionate about, like television, sports, crappy movies, celebrity gossip, wine, beer, ceramic figurines, pop music, fashion, video games, and too many other things to list here, all of which consume energy, time, and emotion from countless millions of people in the developed world. So why did this particular article elicit so much of this sentiment, this self-righteous indignation, this “real world” resentment, this tenor of How dare you write on a topic so unimportant?
As a professor in the Liberal Arts, there is something to it that I recognize intimately. It’s a shade of gall that emerges when people feel like they’ve arrived at the intersection of self-importance and superficiality. It’s an open defiance of stereotype, an odd inversion of the comedian who says something serious, a jarring sensation that unsettles their expectations. It really sets some people off, and the result can be their own raging concoction of envy and sanctimony.
We want serious people to be serious, and silly people to be silly, and a break from type can 
stir resentment. You’re not doing what I want/expect you to do! Sadly, this kind of rigid absolutism denies the fullness of people’s humanity. I’m not going to vote for a particular politician simply because an actor told me to, but I hardly get offended because an actor has an opinion about politics, even if its an uninformed one. Most people have plenty of uninformed opinions about politics, why is it so much worse when an actor does? People have passions, often in areas that defy our own simple expectations about that person. Good. The more people talk and think the better.
Now, let’s get to the important stuff.
Manjoo is an absolute monster!
Everyone knows that two spaces after a period looks better than one. And not only is it more visually appealing, but it also makes it easier to skim, or to re-read and edit one’s own work. Meanwhile, a single space between sentences often leaves the prose looking like a jumble of mush, which is particularly detrimental when the quality of writing is mediocre or worse. And though he contends otherwise, even Manjoo admits that there is no proof whatsoever to his claim that two spaces slow readers down.
Manjoo’s main argument in support of his wrong-headed single space bias is that it is the 
convention typesetters settled on long ago, and that this practice only changed during the 20th century because of monospace, fixed-width typewriters. Fine. But when you stop to think about it, this is really quite a silly thesis. So what if the standard of a double space was born from a dead technology, the manual typewriter? It is ultimately better, not obsolete, and we are lucky to have it. In that respect, it is much like the love seat. That oversized chair was originally designed to seat one, specifically a woman who was wearing a hoop dress or some other large piece of now arcane fashion that demanded substantial space. Hoop dresses may have gone out of style, and thank goodness for that, but I’m hardly going to quit snuggling with my baby on the love seat because of it.
Besides, not only did computers replace those clunky old typewriters we’d used for decades, but they have also largely replaced the drawers full of type that typesetters used for centuries. If the manual typewriter’s role in this question is anachronistic and moot, then so too is the role of 18th century type press.
So what really drives the single space convention in publishing beyond neurosis and dogma? The cost concerns of publishers cannot be overlooked. Paper costs money and single spaces after each period saves paper. But here in the age of the internet? Let’s live a 
little!
To me, two spaces after a period is poetic and logical all at once, graceful and of superior craft. A sentence is a complete thought. It deserves to be set apart in some way, as does the paragraph. Let commas, colons, and semi-colons usher in a single space, as the words within a single sentence are literature’s kissin’ cousins. But a sentence? Never! Periods, questions marks, and exclamation points all deserve to walk on the rose-petaled walkway of a double space.
I mean honestly, what is wrong with that sonofabitch Farhad Manjoo? Why doesn’t he go cure cancer or something?