Grammatically speaking, Conan O’Brien is king.
So says a new list put out by proofreading app Grammarly, whose team ranked the biggest names on Twitter by grammatical correctness. In a report released today (Mar. 1), analysts reviewed 150 tweets from each of the 50 most followed accounts (according to Twitter Counter), searching for unintended misspelled words, incorrect or missing punctuation, and violations of subject-verb agreement.
Human proofreaders then reviewed the offenses culled by the app, leaving out uses of slang, acronyms, and missing punctuation at the end of a tweet. Grammarly marketing analyst Michael Mager tells Quartz the ranking is meant as a hat-tip to celebrities with exemplary writing skills.
US president Barack Obama, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, and philanthropist Bill Gates cluster toward the top of the list, as do talk show hosts O’Brien and Ellen Degeneres, and pop musician Shakira. When all is said and done, though, a tweeter’s grammar skills seem to have little or no bearing on his or her popularity: Pop stars Katy Perry and Justin Bieber, with two of the biggest followings, are clustered in the middle of the list at 26 and 19, respectively. Lady Gaga, with the 6th biggest following, is ranked close to the bottom.