Talk:humorously

Why exactly is the spelling 'humourously' considered obsolete? — This comment was unsigned.

"Obsolete" is supposed to be used here to mean that it would not longer be understood. "Archaic" means that it is used to be intentionally old-fashioned, but would be understood. "Dated" is used especially when we have information about when a term was in fashion and when it fell out of fashion. None of these quite fit this spelling.

The facts are that

1. this spelling was formerly more common than it is now.
2. was never common in the US.
3. occurs but once in BNC, compared to 45 occurrences for "humorously"
4. occurs about 1/20 as often in current Google news as "humorously", mostly in non-US publications

HTH DCDuring TALK 17:43, 15 November 2009 (UTC)