Overmarking

Overmarking is the act of applying marks, annotations, or indicators that exceed what is necessary or appropriate in a given system, task, or context. It can occur across disciplines and can compromise readability, accuracy, or usefulness by introducing redundancy, clutter, or noise.

In linguistics, overmarking can describe the use of redundant grammatical marking or pleonastic features that double-mark a category such as tense, aspect, or evidentiality, or the simultaneous use of multiple agreement or case markers that convey the same information.

In editing and document work, overmarking refers to excessive proofreading marks, comments, or typographic changes that obscure the original text.

In data annotation and machine learning, overmarking occurs when annotators assign positive labels or mark features beyond what is necessary, increasing label noise and bias.

In cartography and surveying, overmarking can describe too many symbols or annotations on a map or polygon boundary, reducing legibility.

Causes include unclear guidelines, inconsistency among team members, risk aversion, or misaligned incentives. Mitigation includes clear standards, review processes, and baseline guidelines for necessary markings.

The term is used variably; some fields consider overmarking a fault, others describe it as a pragmatic or situational choice.