I'm being quizzed on the correct use of describing our brochure; is it flier or flyer?

Searching isn't helping as I've got a dictionary saying "flier," a university going with "flyer," and an agriculture site quoting the AP with "flier."

(I should have stayed with "brochure.")

Dictionary.com
flier: flyer:
Washington State University
fllier/flyerAgComm
Grammar Trap: flier vs. flyer

Americans usually use flier, and flyer is more common in Britain. I think that's basically the answer. So you can use either, really.

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As above, so below

WASU is wrong. (You'd think they'd have time for more research; Pullman is boring.) You want "flier." I, personally, have never seen "flyer" used in this context. However, going with "brochure" is a perfectly acceptable way out of the problem.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

You'll see 'flyer' in Canada (at least in the East), and rarely (if ever) 'flier'. As Jens points out, it may be somewhat of a 'color' 'colour' thing.

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My thoughts too.
OK, thanks all. It's what I thought it was suppose to be; I just wanted to make sure.

I checked my dictionaries,
Oxford Advanced learner has flyer=flier with no modifiers
Concise Oxford doesn't have it in the small leaflet sense, it's the oldest of my dictionaries.
Websters Unabridged had flyer as a technical term used in the textile industry and apart from that has it equivalent to flier.

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"The end of our foundation is the knowledge of causes, and secret motions of things; and the enlarging of the bounds of human empire, to the effecting of all things possible."Trying to make sense of computers, The Error Log.

I'd go with flyer, as I'm used to terms such as "in-store flyers", the Friday community paper is filled with "weekly flyers", etc. Although, "Flyer" does also have a hockey connotation

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We use flyer, but find pilot and brochure acceptable.

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My best friend's monster dictionary of doom says that "flyer" is preferred if you look it up under "flier," but if you look under "flyer," all it says is that it's a variant of "flier." She says that it's the only time her dictionary has failed her, and she's a little upset.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

The current Oxford English Dictionary allows that "The forms flyer, flier are both in good mod[ern] use; in our recent quot[ation]s flyer is more common ..." The OED gives no spelling variation according to meaning.
The New Fowler's Modern English Usage opts for flyer, but suggests "[P]erhaps flier is the more common of the two forms in Am[erican] E[nglish]." Fowler himself, in the original MEU, liked flier for consistency, but noted that flyer was more common (in British English).

Grant Hutchison

So... flip a coin?

If I had to use that particular word, I'd go for flyer in the UK (and, by the look of it, Canada and Australia), and flier in the US. Seems like that way you'll hit the local majority usage, thereby minimizing the number of people who think you've spelled it wrongly.
In those sorts of situations, though, the line of least resistance is to find a less controversial synonym. Are you reluctant to use brochure because your publication is just a single sheet? If so, handbill might do the job, although it has a slightly antique flavour to it.

Grant Hutchison

Flyer / flier strikes me as irritatingly similar to tyre / tire


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We now return you to your regularly scheduled donut

The distinction seems to be a bit more clear-cut there: tyre as standard in the UK, and tire in the US.

Grant Hutchison

no argument - myself, eye thenk the letter 'i' could well be removed from the Englesh language

Sher. And so cood "u". Then yt wood be a lot easyer to rayt thyngs.

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As above, so below

That shood be "ryte" onless yoe are pottyng them on a scale or somethyng.

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Ande yt wode be a lotte easyer to rante about thyngs as well.

Unfurtunately this looks more like a step back in spelling rathen than a step forward, so I really doubt it would happen

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"God bless thee, my son; I will give thee the greatest jewel I have ...
"The end of our foundation is the knowledge of causes, and secret motions of things; and the enlarging of the bounds of human empire, to the effecting of all things possible."Trying to make sense of computers, The Error Log.

Most linguists (at least that I've read) consider the greatest step forward in spelling to be its standardization. Granted, it's not complete (how many non-Americans hear that word as "standarisation"?), but it's a definite improvement. If we removed letters, we'd have to restandarize. It'd be a nightmare!

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

I guess English hit a tripwire.