I actually prefer to see words spelled correctly because I read fast, and when the word is wrong it stops me in my tracks.
However, I sure wish we could fix a bunch of words and give 'em sane spellings!
It's just like our computers: The 8008 was successful, and when Intel came out with the 8080, they wanted to keep their market share by making it "source code compatible" (if I recall correctly). Then, of course, the 8086 was another "source code compatible" upgrade. The instruction set is messy, and I really wish it had more registers. But most of the other CPUs with nicer instruction/register sets didn't get popular enough. So we're stuck with some oddball special cases in our assembler code....
Update: I just recalled that at my son's school, they're not emphasizing spelling so much as communications. Perhaps the next generation will have a shot at improving our spelling!