It's / Its

[SeaJayPea]

May I, dare I, presume to correct some of my fellow contributors? I was brought up at a time when bad spelling or misuse of words brought about a sharp rap on the knuckles. This one was my primary school teacher's particular bete noire.

It's with an apostrophe means 'IT IS'. It does not indicate a possessive. It's the one exception (see what I did there?).

Its without the apostrophe does indicate the possessive 'the car finished up on its roof' is right.

Probably shouldn't identify worst offenders, so I won't. You know who you are....

Just sayin'

[jno]

I'm impressed at the idea that anyone was taught at school how much space to leave before a question mark. I did learn handwriting at school but never a word of instruction about how many millimetres were appropriate.

[BlueToffee]

Sitting in e hospital waiting room yesterday there was a sign opposite me that had 3 floating apostrophes, each of them referred to patients in the plural, each of them was spelled patient's.

I think and hope I'm right with this observation!

[Obiter]

...and while we're on the subject of apostrophes, don't get me started on the difference between your and you're, which seems to defeat a lot of people.

[grasscarp]

I like the greengrocer sign Potatoe's

[Hopkirk]

I feel sorry for non english speakers trying to learn the language.

Far too many rules and exceptions.

[grasscarp]

I'm learning Russia Hopkirk. It has rather more rules. After 4 years I still find endings of nouns in different cases difficult.

[Obiter]

...not to mention the rules regarding the use of numbers with nouns in different cases!

[grasscarp]

And adjectives!

[Obiter]

...and verbs of motion!

[grasscarp]

Aaghhh! I am on to carrying and transporting now which is also different for one occasion or there and back.

[Cloverjo]

SeaJayPea says the offenders know who they are. I don't think they do. How many times do we see "would of" when it has often been stated here and on tv and radio that it is wrong.

[kvalidir]

I think the trouble with 'would of' is aural in that it sounds awfully like 'would've' so once misheard by a child who hasn't seen it written down it sticks in their heads and you get 'would of' as adults which is so common in some places it's almost normal.

[Tilly2]

To say, 'You know who you are....' implies that they are doing it on purpose. I don't think that is the case.

[Old_Geezer]

I suspect the rules change because so many illiterate folk get it wrong, that officialdom finally gives up and allows things to go to the 'lowest common denominator' level.

Who qualifies as official grammar definers in this country ?

[Hopkirk]

... and who wrote the rules in the first place?

When you see olde english written it often is completely different to modern language, so it has obviously changed and evolved over the years.

Do we now have to stick with confusing rules because it offends people to see change?

[jim360]

The problem isn't really too many rules. If anything it's exactly the opposite. But actually it's not really a problem in the long run. Over the centuries and perhaps entirely unconsciously, English speakers shed all the baggage of, say, gender in nouns, pages and pages of conjugations for even the simplest verbs, agreements in adjectives and so on. The result is a language that at times can feel a bit all over the place but is also rich in variety; no other language even comes close in terms of vocabulary.

[jno]

Hopkirk, if you want to communicate with people right now, surely it's useful to have some agreement on what language you're using? If you want to communicate with some imaginary creature to be born a thousand years from now, you can make up any rules you like and hope he'll understand them when he gets here.

The rules aren't confusing; people just aren't taught them any more.

[Hopkirk]

The rules are confusing, how can you say they are not?

[Tilly2]

They are taught, jno.

[rccatnap]

What sort of word is 'lol' ?

Thank you jno, you are correct and I suspect sunny-dave knew that as well.
He was probably just being delightfully disingenuous.

Lynne Truss's book 'Eats, shoots and leaves' makes entertaining and informative reading. It spells out her zero tolerance approach to punctuation. Thoroughly recommended!