Welcome back, Folly-ites! Here are the Grammar Cop’s picks o’ the week.
- From the NATIONAL POST: “They appeared to exist in discreet worlds, almost on different planes of reality.” Unless you’re talking about worlds that are, um, “modest,” then you mean discrete (distinct, disconnected).
- SALON.COM: “The elephant in the room is Sanders minority-voter problem.” Now this looks as if the writer wasn’t sure where to put the apostrophe – so he just left it out altogether. I can almost hear him thinking, “Hmm… is it Sanders’? Or Sanders’s…? Or Sander’s?” (For the record, it’s Sanders’s. Check with the New York Times and Washington Post if you don’t believe me.)
- CRAIGSLIST AD: “[G]ood content is absolutely essential to creating a companies voice and message. You need to establish and adhere to style guidelines that make our content consistent.” This one really makes me laugh. It’s an ad for a “digital copywriter,” wherein they very sanctimoniously spell out that they want this person to be highly skilled. But “companies” as a singular possessive? I think not! Of course it is company’s. By the way, the pay they’re offering is not a whole lot more than minimum wage. Off with their heads, I say!
Hmph. I am going to work on my book now. At least I have compleat controle over it.
Crossed Eyes and Dotted Tees 
I have always found the extra s
as in Sanders’s strange. But I know it’s correct.
I often see only the apostrophe after the s.
I am not surprised. Education sucks and people are getting
more stupid. IMHO
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True, sad to say!
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If they write “companies” instead of “company’s,” they do not deserve minimum wage. Also, what does a “digital copywriter” work on? Fingers?
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Bwahahaha! Fingers! You slay me, Gerri!
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I would go so far as to say they also should have changed ‘our’ to ‘your’ in this sentence: “You need to establish and adhere to style guidelines that make our content consistent.” They are talking to the potential customer, so, the address should be consistent. BaZinga!
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Well, actually they’re talking to a potential employee. The ad was placed by some sort of agency, wanting to hire a copywriter. So they’re telling the writer (“you,” i.e. the potential employee reading the ad) that “you” will need to respect “our” (in-house) way of doing things.
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See, this is where different people read things differently. I thought it was directed at the potential buyers as in ‘you as a client must be confident that your work reflects your business in the best possible way’. But I understand how you put it as well.
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I think the glitch lies in the fact that you didn’t get to see the ad in its entirety on Craigslist. Lack of context, in other words.
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Craigslist??? They posted an ad on Craigslist? They are totally going to butcher your grammar and bury it in a field somewhere.
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