-146 characters left in your response???

<p>how does this "500 characters left" work??to be specific, for NYU supplements..by characters, im taking it as letters and punctuations..but that doesnt seem to be the case, even spaces count...however, we can go over the 500 character limit, but it will say "Characters left in your response -146"..does that mean its not acceptable? or it doesnt matter many over the limit i write..just not too much..btw word says that i have below 500 characters..</p>