Idiom:
for free Informal
Without charge

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

free (of charge) = without charge = kostenlos, gratis

to get sth. for nothing = etw. kostenlos bekommen

Never mind this "informal" nonsense.
Do you want to learn English with correct grammar, or don't you?
"Informal" misuse of a language, with bad grammar, does not make it right.
I wrote this for the benefit of people, who want to learn to speak and write good English, in a grammatically correct way.

Do you want to learn English with correct grammar, or don't you?

I'm good, thanks for asking.

"For free" is an idiomatic expression meaning "without charge or compensation." It is slightly informal, perhaps, but not incorrect; it's what everybody says, so let's go with the crowd on this one. New Fowler's Modern English Usage says that is was initially an American pleonasm, but it's now used fairly regularly on both sides of the Atlantic in "light-hearted contexts".

Subscribing to the "tolerant descriptivist" school of thought myself, I say let's keep it. I'm happy to support an "informal" or "colloquial" tag, of course.

I wrote this for the benefit of people, who want to learn to speak and write good English, in a grammatically correct way.

But the dictionary exists inter alia to help people who might be reading or listening to normal idiomatic English. It would be much less helpful if it left out everything the compilers personally disapproved of. (Or should I say, "of which the compilers personally disapproved"?)

CARULLUS

Niemand braucht Bücher, die schlimme Grammatik lehren oder verzeihen. Nobody needs books which teach or condone poor grammar. You can hear sloppy and ungrammatical speech in any pub or street-corner, from any poorly-educated, semi-literate person; but that doesn't make it a good example to follow. This is where you don't "go with the crowd". You will only sound poorly trained if you do.
The real need is for books which will help students to avoid bad grammar.

I notice you are a native speaker of Austrian German. If you try to be a serious student of the English language, you should heed the advice of a native English speaker.
You can translate bad English grammar into good German, but never translate German "kostenlos" into "for free." Something is either free or it isn't. There's no need for the preposition "for".

Just because something's in a book, that doesn't make it right.
"Huckleberry Finn" was written in the coarse Mississippi dialect (in horribly ungrammatical "English" with atrocious spelling), because it (brilliantly) depicted a boy who had been brought up very roughly, was badly neglected, and almost illiterate. That didn't make the dialect a good example to follow.

In case you didn't know, "for free" was deliberately invented for film scripts (e.g. Jerry Lewis films), just to show that he was portraying a none-too-bright character.

for free

: without charge : at no cost
▪ If you buy two boxes of cereal, you'll get another box for free. [=without paying any more money]

http://www.learnersdictionary.com/search/free[1]

learnersdictionary

PHRASES:
for free: [informal] without cost or payment: these professionals were giving their time for free.
NOAD (New Oxford American Dictionary)

for free without charge, gratis, as in you can't expect the doctor to treat you for free. 
[colloquial; c. 1900]
American Heritage dictionary of Idioms.

Phrases:
for free
[informal] without cost or payment: these professionals were giving their time for free.
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/free...


for free (coll.) umsonst.
Copyrightinformationen
Duden-Oxford [Großwörterbuch Englisch]
Die elektronische Version basiert auf der 3., überarbeiteten und erweiterten Auflage der Buchausgabe 2005.

Usage: colloquial or informal.

Descriptive grammarians ask the question, "What is English (or another language) like--what are its forms and how do they function in various situations?" By contrast, prescriptive grammarians ask "What should English be like--what forms should people use and what functions should they serve?"
http://www.pbs.org/speak/speech/correct/presc...


related discussion: want ad(s) - die Suchanzeige(n) - #8

I could support adding a marking as informal or colloquial, but I wouldn't support deleting the entry.


>>deliberately invented for film scripts (e.g. Jerry Lewis films), just to show that he was portraying a none-too-bright character.

If you have any evidence for that claim, you should cite it, as you should have presented evidence supporting your opinion when you started this thread. You owe a thank-you to wmw and me1 (*waving* (-: ) for helping you out with dictionary citations.


>>for the benefit of people, who want to learn to speak and write good English, in a grammatically correct way.

In case you are one of those people, perhaps you would like to note that both those commas are wrong.

Da alicerae nach eigener Aussage aus dem "Bundesland Gross Britannien" stammt, scheint sie alle AE-Besonderheiten für "sehr schlimme Englische Grammatik" zu halten.

Als Großmeisterin des Englischen erspart sie sich die Mühe, Belege für ihre Behauptungen zu liefern. Leider schreibt sie auch "schlimmes Deutsch": es gibt z.B. keine "schlimme Grammatik" im Deutschen, höchstens eine fehlerhafte Grammatik, und Bücher, die etwas verzeihen, sind auch noch nicht erfunden.

Ob man ihr ihre Rechthaberei und Besserwisserei verzeihen kann bzw. sollte, weiß ich nicht.

Leo has:

for free- kostenlos
for free- umsonst [ugs.]
for free- für lau [ugs.]
at no charge- kostenlos
free - kostenlos
free of charge- kostenlos Adj.
free of cost- kostenlos Adj.
freebie - kostenlos
gratis - kostenlos
gratuitous - free of charge, e.g. service adj. - kostenlos

for free
informal without cost or payment:these professionals were giving their time for free
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/free

for free colloq without payment.
http://www.chambersharrap.co.uk/chambers/feat...

for free: [informal] without cost or payment: these professionals were giving their time for free.
NOAD (New Oxford American Dictionary)

for free without charge, gratis, as in you can't expect the doctor to treat you for free.
[colloquial; c. 1900]
American Heritage dictionary of Idioms.

for free (coll.) umsonst.
Copyrightinformationen
Duden-Oxford [Großwörterbuch Englisch]

Though this be madness, yet there is method in it. I can see an argument for removing the first couple on Leo's list. "Kostenlos" isn't especially colloquial or informal, while the other two translations match "for free" better: Duden describes "umsonst" and "für lau" as "landsch." which presumably means they are less businesslike.

Die deutsche Formulierung "für lau" ist grammatisch gesehen wohl ähnlich unsinnig wie das englische "for free", denn eine Präposition lässt sich einfach nicht mit einem Adjektiv verbinden. Trotzdem kommen beide Ausdrücke in den jeweiligen Umgangssprachen vor. Im Deutschen hört man auch zunehmend "für umsonst", wohl unter dem Einfluss des englischen Ausdrucks.

@alicerae: Der Sinn eines Wörterbuchs wie LEO ist nicht, grammatisch korrektes Englisch zu lehren, und alles, was diesem widerspricht, einfach zu ignorieren. Wer in irgendeinem Text über die Formulierung "for free" stolpert, dem ist nicht geholfen, wenn diese in LEO gar nicht erscheint. Sie kommt vor, und zwar oft (Google liefert fast 2 Milliarden Treffer!), und gehört damit ins Wörterbuch. Eine Markierung als ugs. oder coll. oder inf. wäre natürlich sinnvoll.

... denn eine Präposition lässt sich einfach nicht mit einem Adjektiv verbinden.

Du meinst sowas wie for ever, for good oder for sure?

Ansonsten wurde mE eigtl alles gesagt.

Du meinst sowas wie for ever, for good oder for sure?

Ever ist kein Adjektiv, und for good und for sure sind spezielle Verwendungen des Wörtchens "for". Auch im Deutschen kann man schließlich sagen "ich halte das für gut", aber nicht "das ist für gut".

... noch etwas zur Bedeutung von 'umsonst' . . .

... War der Kursbesuch umsonst? - Nein, ich hab da was gelernt! . . .

... War der Kursbesuch kostenlos? - Nein, die Gebühr war gesalzen! . . .

LEO: Dictionary: umsonst . . .

You have all just proved the point, which I needed to make: i.e. an entry in dictionary is no guarantee of good grammar.

Enschuldigen Sie mich: I muss zum Laden gehen, um meine "für- kostenlosen" Einkäufe abholen. Dann soll ich, mit meiner "für-kostenlosen" Autobusfahrkarte, etwa "nassen" Regen vermeiden.
Morgen, will ich ein "unterwasserisches"U-Boot besuchen, um etwa Amerikanischen Schlechtegrammatikbücher im Meer sinken.
Komisch - Nicht?

Germans don't like literary redundancies either.

Ouch; you must have been here a long time to be using German commas in all your relative clauses :-)

Yes, the commas are German, but the sentences intended to be German are not...

"You have all just proved the point, which I needed to make: i.e. an entry in dictionary is no guarantee of good grammar." - indeed, and neither is an entry in a dictionary a guarantee for the correct use of any word (I know, I tried and miserably failed too many times to count).

Not quite sure what you're getting at.

Not sure about the comma in your sentence above, sez Edith.

A dictionary should function as an aid to translation. For an entry to be valid, it should "work" in both directions.
It may seem all very well for bad English grammar to be translated into good German; but students should not be misled into believing that it is acceptable to translate good German into incorrect English. Somebody has to make this point. If LEO will not do this, then I will.

I can never understand why Germans, who are so fussy about their own grammar and grammatical intricacies, will then defend poor English grammar to the last grasp. Are Germans the only ones in the world, who are allowed to be fussy about the grammar of their national language?

As to commas, I use them in the way I was taught - before conjunctions, wrapped around relative clauses, where a slight pause is intended, or where there is a slight change in direction.
I tried translating one of Guido Knopp's books, not so long ago.
His long, involved sentences, with hardly a comma anywhere to help break them up a bit, just about drove me nuts.

A dictionary should function as an aid to translation. For an entry to be valid, it should "work" in both directions.
It may seem all very well for bad English grammar to be translated into good German; but students should not be misled into believing that it is acceptable to translate good German into incorrect English. Somebody has to make this point. If LEO will not do this, then I will.


Which is why, as CM2DD pointed out, the expression "for free", which does exist and is used by native speakers of the English language, should be tagged "informal" or "colloquial" and paired with equally informal/colloquial German expressions such as "für lau" rather than with "kostenlos", which is the wrong register. But remain in the dictionary it should.


As to commas, I use them in the way I was taught - before conjunctions, wrapped around relative clauses, where a slight pause is intended, or where there is a slight change in direction.  

I'd recommend looking up "defining and non-defining relative clauses", at least I believe that is the correct name. Or, possibly, "Eats, shoots and leaves" by Lynne Truss (sp.?), a book I have heard of but not read myself. Maybe you'll rethink some of your commas. Only very few English native speakers would place a comma in this sentence, for example:
Are Germans the only ones in the world, who are allowed to be fussy about the grammar of their national language?

I'd agree that it should be marked, but not that it should be deleted.

alicerae, I am not entirely sure what you mean by: "You have all just proved the point, which I needed to make: i.e. an entry in dictionary is no guarantee of good grammar."

I entirely agree with the assertion that an entry in a dictionary is not a guarantee of good grammar- indeed it is not. That said, a dictionary is not a rulebook of good grammar, it is a descriptive collection of words in use.

What I don't understand is firstly why you needed to make that comment, and secondly, having made it, why you appear to be hell-bent on contradicting it by arguing that it must be deleted as it is bad grammar?

?

Why didn't you read my original post?

I did, and having battled my way through the German, rendered near-incomprehensible by the application of Yoda-like grammar, I found that it had little foundation (yes, the entry should be tagged, but not deleted). It also contradicted your later comment in which you appeared to acknowledge that a dictionary entry does not guarantee the correctness of the grammar.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/dining/25se...
Not that their parents, guardians and grandparents were spared paying for the privilege of children’s company. “I suppose you couldn’t really expect that adults would eat for free,” said Kathy Saunders, a tourist from Piedmont, Calif.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/22/nyregion/22...
For Mr. Dershowitz, class of 1959, it was payback of a kind. "I got to go to Brooklyn College for free, which was about what I could afford," he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/25/arts/music/...
As if to explain, or compensate, for the gaffe, he altered the words of the song a few moments later, perfectly in rhythm and in key: “Lyrics to old songs that you don’t know/And you embarrass yourself at MSG/But it doesn’t matter one bit, everyone got in for free.”

Das kriegst du fuer lau!

LEO:
für lau [ugs.] --- for free
etw. (von jmdm.) kriegen [ugs.] ---to get sth. (from, off so.)

Wenn wir die Argumentation umdrehen, dann muessen wir die Eintraege zu "fuer lau" im Sinn von "kostenlos" und "kriegen" im Sinn von "bekommen" ebenfalls loeschen. Beides ist umgangssprachliches, "falsches" Deutsch. Die eigentlichen Bedeutungen der Woerter sind "handwarm" und "(ein)fangen".

Ob LEO dann mit der Uebersetzung "You catch it for lukewarm" wirklich der Kommunikation beitraegt, sei dahingestellt. Ich bliebe bei "You will get it for free", aber das ist natuerlich eine Frage der persoenlichen Vorliebe.

Ernsthaft: Kein Problem mit einer Auszeichnung als coll. und auch mit der Loeschung von "for free - kostenlos" als falsche Ebene. Ich wuerde aber "for free --- umsonst [ugs.]" beibehalten. "Fuer lau" kommt mir viel staerker umgangssprachlich vor als dies bei "for free" der Fall ist. In den obigen Beispielen aus der NY Times faende ich die Uebersetzung mit "kostenlos" zu gehoben, aber "fuer lau" doch zu umgangssprachlich. "Umsonst" gaebe den Ton der obigen Zitat recht gut wieder, denke ich.

I never used the word "deleted".
I said the term should tagged with a warning that it is grammatically incorrect. It is better grammar to say "for nothing".
You would be marked down in a college or University exam, if you used the term "for free" in a translation from German into English. You would be most unlikely to get a job as an English teacher, if you insist in using ungrammatical terms, or indeed any other position where good English grammar is required.

The New Oxford Dictionary of English führt auf:

for free informal without cost or payment: these professionals were giving their time for free

@alicerae, willst Du uns allen Ernstes weismachen, das New Oxford Dict. verbreite "bad grammar"?

Commas and "if" clauses:
http://www.ego4u.com/en/cram-up/writing/comma?10

Commas with defining and non-defining relative clauses:
http://esl.about.com/cs/teachingresources/a/b...

Cambridge Guide to English Usage:

"Faced with an advertising line like:
Buy two medium pizzas and get a cup of coffee for free
few customers think they are really getting something for nothing. But they will probably not query the grammar of for free either - just accept it as commercial rhetoric. In grammatical terms it makes a full adverbial phrase out of the word free, which otherwise seems very ordinary and even negligible as the complementary adjective/adverb in get a cup of coffee free. The phrase itself is perfectly grammatical if we allow that free is a zero adverb, which can combine with for just like for ever, for once. In contexts other than advertising, people sometimes find for free excessive when free would suffice. But there are occasions when it prevents ambiguity, as in:
She and her family gladly work for free at the army base.
For free thus seems able to earn its keep."

>>You would be marked down in a college or University exam, if you used the term "for free" in a translation from German into English.

That was another typically German comma error. Can you spot it?

Also, in AE at least, it should also be 'marked down on,' and 'university' with a small U, since it is not a proper name.

>>if you insist in using ungrammatical terms

—> insist on

You're welcome.


But seriously: CM2DD's point in #10 and Mausling's in #24 are reasonable, filling in the gaps that the original poster was oblivious to.

Surely we're all in agreement that the English entry should remain in the dictionary, but with appropriate markings and translation options.

You can hear sloppy and ungrammatical speech in any pub or street-corner, from any poorly-educated, semi-literate person; but that doesn't make it a good example to follow. This is where you don't "go with the crowd". You will only sound poorly trained if you do.
Mit Verlaub, da sich in meinen rein dienstlichen E-Mails der Ausdruck "for free" 468-mal finden lässt und alle E-Mails entweder von Naturwissenschaftlern oder Angegestellten biotechnologischer Firmen aus aller Welt stammen, kann ich dem poorly educated (als non-native erscheint mir der Bindestrich inkorrekt) nicht zustimmen.
 
Zudem: I can count up to 10 in at least seven different languages (including Swedish).
Meine Tochter ist 10 und steht diesem nicht nach.

Auch wenn aliceraes Beitraege, die bei mir einen arroganten und uneinsichtigen Eindruck erwecken, automatisch den Widerspruchsgeist wecken, bin ich ihr dafuer dankbar, meine Aufmerksamkeit auf die sehr umgangssprachliche Natur von "for free" gelenkt zu haben. Diese war mir so deutlich nicht bewusst. (Zugegeben, mein Englisch-Niveau liegt unter dem des durchschnittlichen Posters hier, aber wahrscheinlich ueber dem des durchschnittlichen Woerterbuchbenutzers.)

@Alicerae, "schlampige" Umgangssprache existiert nun einmal und du wirst die LEOs nicht dazu ueberzeugen koennen fuer diese keine entsprechenden Uebersetzungen anzubieten. Falls du dich dazu durchringen koenntest, in solchen Faellen fuer eine entsprechende Kennzeichnung zu argumentieren (oder eventuell passende deutsche "schlampige" Ausdruecke vorschlagen koenntest), wuerdest du hier auf viel mehr Zustimmung stossen. Deine grundsaetzliche Kritik an dem Eintrag ist voellig gerechtfertig und sehr hilfreich.

Betrachte es doch einmal so: Dein Ziel ist anscheinend die Erziehung des Nicht-Muttersprachlers zu gutem Englisch. Der typische Schueler, der "for free" in LEO nachschaut und nicht findet, wird deshalb nicht denken, dies sei schlechtes Englisch. Im schlimmsten Fall glaubt er eine coole, neue Formulierung gefunden zu haben und benutzt sie erst recht. Derselbe Schueler, der die Uebersetzung "fuer lau" erhaelt, wird "for free" in Englischaufsaetzen aus den selben Gruenden vermeiden wie (hoffentlich) "fuer lau" in Deutscharbeiten.

You would be most unlikely to get a job as an English teacher, if you insist in using ungrammatical terms, or indeed any other position where good English grammar is required.

And with your high standards, you would be unlikely to get a job in advertising, scriptwriting, or indeed in any field where a feel for living English is important.

HTH

#26 You would be most unlikely to get a job as an English teacher, if you insist in using ungrammatical terms, or indeed any other position where good English grammar is required.

Das stimmt absolut nicht. Hier mal ein paar Beispiele:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2193
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2936
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2997
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3201

Die Autoren dieser Texte sind Universitätsprofessoren für Linguistik. Mehr braucht man zur oben zitierten Aussage wohl nicht zu sagen...

... das kam aber aus #25 . . .