Apostrophe or not?

[SandraDee]

Does anyone know why the Chocolats put an apostrophe before the 's'? Should there be a noun after their name that belongs to them (e.g. Chocolat's records) or is it abbreviated for 'is' (e.g. Chocolat's good) or is it always put there in error? Sorry to be anal but I need to know as it irritates me whenever I look at the LP sleeve & single label! :evil:

[Bernie]

Always wondered about that as well!

[SandraDee]

Glad its not just me! Maybe Belgians use apostrophes in a different way. :-?

[Forrrce]

Considering 90% of English-speakers use apostrophes incorrectly, i.e. "Steely Dan's '70s Disco" will more often than not be written "Steely Dans 70's Disco" :roll:, I'm surprised anybody would notice :D :D :D ...but it's nice to get that off my chest, anyway!
:lol:

[SandraDee]

It's one of my pet hates Forrrce. My boss sent me an e-mail today saying 'the coffee's are on me' - why the apostrophe? The coffee's what are on him exactly?!

[BrunoRepublic]

My theory is that they added the apostraphe because it looked more English, thus foreign and hip. Too bad they got it wrong.

My personal pet-hate-misplaced-apostraphe is the one in CDs and DVDs. I see this EVERYWHERE, even on professional signs and websites. The only conceivable correct use that I can think for "CD's" is if you're referring to something belonging to Celine Dion, and just going by her initials. i.e. "That's not a garden gnome; it's CD's husband."

An earlier version of the manual for the billing platform that I work on consistently used the term "plug-in's". I cringed every time I read it.

[SandraDee]

I suppose in certain circumstances like us chatting on this forum it doesn't bother me that much but when I see it printed on record covers or adverts on vans by supposedly professional printers it really bugs me.

[Bernie]

There is a US retailer called "Lands' End" and they readily acknowledge that it is incorrect usage. Even so, they decided to keep the name anyway.

As for Chocolat's I guess it was simply an error that stuck.

[markydefad]

And always remember it is Gary TOMS Empire...NOT Gary Tom's Empire....the last name was TOMS, not a possessive. :roll:

[NickNack]

It's one of my pet hates Forrrce. My boss sent me an e-mail today saying 'the coffee's are on me' - why the apostrophe? The coffee's what are on him exactly?!

I hear ya, Steely. Sadder still is that I understand your boss' contraction: "The coffee is on me". Society's need for everything to be quick and fast shows up in our speech. I'm not an English major but I guess it should really be: "The coffee, it's on me".

Of course, that could mean he's paying for it or he just spilled it all over himself :roll: . F*&% IT! "Hey guys, I'm buying the coffee today." How's that? :D

[QUINNY]

Right now, December 17th 2003, England is possibly the worst place in the world for the misuse of English. Go to any 50p store, any market, car dealership, small shop, office etc and you can see the misuse of the apostrophe s everywhere. As a nation we are so damned ignorant. The little English I know was forced into my brain, 'cos as a child I really didn't see the point of English Language lessons. None of the English I read in books ever sounded anything like the English that was spoken by my family, friends and contemporaries at school. It was like something from another age, another planet.......or so I thought. In fact I was so anti-English lessons of any sort, that I refused to read any fiction books.
Therefore, if I mess up occasionally, now you know why.

[Forrrce]

Unfortunately, most people assume that an apostrophe before an 's' constitutes a plural. This is by far the most common misuse - and even though it's fairly routine and everyday, it never fails to rile me. For some reason, this rampant misuse looks even more ridiculous on longer words.

In the abbreviation context, the apostrophe's inevitably misplaced for the worst. "1970s" - yes. "1970's" - no, unless immediately followed with something pertaining to the year 1970.
" '70s" - yes. "70's" - no, for exactly the same reasons. "70s' " is practically abused, 100%. But no-one seems to learn. I spent a lot of time on the internet and standards of grammar are pretty poor, across the board, wherever you look. Gawd 'elp us.

And another thing...why does all Microsoft documentation, on the web, paper, software or whatever, have commas before the word 'and', like it's going out of fashion? All these unnecessary pauses send me 'round the bend! I need to sit down... :roll:

[ladyboygrimsby]

The situation is hardly helped by the BBC who routinely misuse the apostrophe on news captions. My local library also has "DVD's" advertised on its plaque outside. If both the library service and the BBC can't be bothered to set an English standard, what hope is there for the rest of the population? I went in and complained to the library and they didn't even seem to understand what I was saying, so I gave up.

If you know any functionally illiterate English users, I'd recommend buying them Eats Shoots Leaves by Lynne Truss for Christmas. It's a paean to good punctuation and funny, too.

[Nano]

Some years ago, in Argentina streets you could see a whole new craze about stores with names ending with that 's, to put some English flavor. Problem was, it was added not only to Spanish names (like "Susana's") but also in plurals, because in Spanish most of them end with an S. So instead of "Bananas" you had "Banana's", which, of course, means nothing out of the mind of the guy who wrote it. Verrry irritative! :evil:

[originalbigm]

Queen's English - Yes
Queens English -No

Did I got it right?

[Marcio**]

(wrong) "Bond 77'' by Marvin Hamlisch.
(right) "Bond '77" by Marvin Hamlisch.
(and I'm in state of confusion :D )

[02tranzam]

i cant's beleive's this subjects' is on it's' second page's
carmine :lol:

[darrens]

I'm astonished and pleasantly surprised to see that people who like perfection in their music like me, also like perfection in their use of the English Language (like me)!

I too find misused apostrophes very annoying. A similar discussion ensued on another, non-music related forum of which I am a member, but hardly anyone else either had the same opinion as me, or were able to place apostrophes in the right places!

The worst one I've ever seen, a sign by the side of the road "Xma's tree's for sale"

[BrunoRepublic]

A personal peeve of mine: American companies that open up shop here, and do not correct the spelling on any of their marketing materials (i.e. Color instead of Colour).

[Bernie]

A personal peeve of mine: American companies that open up shop here, and do not correct the spelling on any of their marketing materials (i.e. Color instead of Colour).

Graham, don't you know that Canada is the 51st US state? :-)

[Forrrce]

A digression, though not totally off-topic...incorrect use if the word 'Lyrics'. Not many people know that the word 'lyric' actually means the words to a song as whole, as opposed to 'lines', 'verses' or 'words' in or from a song - therefore referring to the 'lyrics' in a song is actually incorrect (this is akin to referring to the 'songs within a song', as opposed to 'words', 'verses' or 'lines' within a song).

Listening at the back? I'll begin:

'Heard that Sophie Ellis-Bextor song? Great lyrics..' (nay)

'Yeah, I heard the f**ker..shite lyric, innit?' (yay)

Welcome to my grammar-Nazi masterclass...

[BrunoRepublic]

Well, 'font' is another word that has been torn from its original meaning in the information age. Font originally referred only to the size of the letter, not the style (which is the typeface).

But English is an evolving language, and the meanings of words can change over time. So I'll let font and lyrics be, as this is now more widespread than the original meanings.

And then there are words which have changed, because nobody could remember how to pronounce them... a good example is the word 'forte', as borrowed from the French. It's usually pronounced 'for-tay' as in "Being able to listen to Whitney Houston without vomiting is not my for-tay". But there is no accent on the e in French, so it should really be 'fort'. Dr. Seuss' name is actually pronounced 'Soiss'. Nobody can agree on the proper way to say 'banal'. And someone told me that we've been saying 'Nokia' incorrectly all along...

But apostraphes in CDs and DVDs? No, I can't accept that. It's just plain wrong.

[Forrrce]

CD's, DVD's, Video's :roll: ...
I reckon some misuse the apostrophe after 'CD' or other such abbreviations, because they imagine another letter would give a whole new abbreviation (example: "CDs? what's a C.D.S. ?") - it should be no mystery that one abbreviates with capitals - and you simply add your small 's' (no apostrophe, remember) for your plurals.

[BrunoRepublic]

But don't the British only capitalize the first letter of an acronym if it is spoken as a word? I see this consistently on the BBC's site, as in "Millions threatened by Aids". Here it would always be "Millions threatened by AIDS". Seeing acronyms not all in caps sure looks strange to me...

[Forrrce]

This is not something I have noticed in general, as I'm too busy seething over apostrophe's being misused.

Having said that, DATs have long been 'dats' and there may be other examples I subconsciously follow, or simply don't notice. At the same time, I'm on auto-pilot mostly, so I'll correct a written, minor faux-pas mentally and not worry about it thereafter.

For many years here, Lucozade's slogan was 'Lucozade aids recovery' (everybody here knows Lucozade like the rest of the world knows Coca Cola - I'm not sure if it's quite the same everywhere else). Around '87, we were bombarded with the 'Don't Die Of Ignorance' anti-AIDS campaign - and Lucozade, naturally, dropped their comforting strapline.

It now seems (here, at least) that AIDS, the acronym/abbreviation has the monoply on the word 'aids'. I seldom hear it used, unless in reference to the disease. This may be the reason for the misuse - AIDS in now just a word itself.