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"The sound effects could of been better."

I found the above comment on YouTube. The correct sentence is of course:

"The sound effects could have been better" or "The sound effects could've been better."

I wonder if he(or she) deliberately wrote "of" instead of "have." I ask this because I often see this type of misspelling.

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As many sites on the English language explain, "could of" (could've) is commonly written for "could have" - along with "should of" (should've), "might of" (might've) and their cousins.

The error arises from the manner in which people speak and is most common among people more familiar with the spoken rather than the written form of English.

It arises because "could've" sounds so close to "could of". Of course, it's wrong.

See:

www.oxforddictionaries.com/words/could-of-or-could-have

englishplus.com/grammar/00000204.htm

...and many others

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