More Example's (!) of the Misuse of It's for Its
From the Web and the CD comment's section:
1. Crony Capitalism at it's best!
2. Hailing from Brooklyn, NY, the band is paving it's own unique path in the world.
3. Reductio ad Absurdum is a legitimate technique for pushing an argument to it's logical limits and showing it to be absurd.
4. I'll take the opportunity costs of shale gas over it's subsidized or less environmental alternatives.
5. And it's sold, for it's "skin rejuvenating properties.”
6. You actually made a case for it's existence.
Remember the simple (maybe not) rule: It's is a contraction for "it is."
4 Comments:
I'm a serial offender!!
So am I an I do not care.
The possessive form of something is the thing with 's. So it's is belonging to it.
As long as the meaning is clear in use and I do not think it is makes sense as a substitute for it's in any of your examples, it does nto matter.
I do not thing the grammar police have a swat team. Though aparently the department of education does.
It's a pretty simple rule, and should be easily learned in elementary school. And once you know the rule, you know it for life and never forget it. Spend 5 minutes thinking about it, learn the rule, and you've got it forever. Once you know the rule, the misuse of "it's" stands out like a sore thumb and you recognize it immediately. It's NOT at all complicated. And if that rule is not important, then none of the grammar rules, spelling and punctuation rules are important either. We really can't pick and choose which grammar rules we decide to follow and which ones we decide are OK to break.
Sloppy writing reflects sloppy thinking. Clear, precise wrtiting reflects clear thinking.
I wonder if some of the confusion comes from the fact that this rule, while simple, is a little unique.
For nouns, "'s" is a possessive. I think, when typing something, we see the "it" as a noun (unlike the pronoun it is). Because of that momentary confusion, the habit is to write "'s".
Maybe it is better to say that "'s" is only possessive when attached to a noun. Otherwise, "'s" is a contraction.
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