Why is the apostrophe so misunderstood? What's the solution? Who's the solution?

’ I ’ think’ it’s mainly’ used’ for’ decoration’ now’ a’ days’

I wish I knew.
It does make for a nice tear in my emoticons though, :’(

I will admit, I don’t understand the usage of semicolons on the slightest. I dunno how people mess up apostrophes though.

I don’t know why it’s misunderstood. Online I do get lazy, but I try to follow the basic rules.

What’s the big deal if it’s over used? It’s just an apostrophe, maybe often misunderstood, but that’s just the way apostrophe’s are and they know that’s their lot in life when they were born. :(

You know what they say about solutions: if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the precipitate.

What? Not helpful?

Don’t make your answers too interesting. I have to sign off due to scary thunder and lightening.

Buy an armload of Bob the Angry Flower posters and hang ‘em everywhere.

@gailcalled Get the candles out and good luck.

Without the apostrophe, how could people make that hilarious ascii “art” that was all the rage in the 90s?

@Jeruba Where/how do you come up with these things? haha.

I bet gail asked this question because of my grammar; your and you’re

@chyna,

1. Editors send things like this to each other, gnashing their teeth and commiserating. They make us feel better for a little while.

2. I have a Velcro brain for a considerable quantity of miscellany. If only somebody will ask the right question, I can look pretty smart. Truthfully, the number of things I don’t know outnumbers the things I do in more or less cosmic proportions.

3. There is a secret place in my heart where I am Bob the Angry Flower.

4. I don’t know. Eclecticism is one of the great Fluther commonalities.

http://www.fluther.com/disc/19460/has-the-time-come-for-the-apostrophe-lecture/

:D

I think most of the errors related to the apostrophe in typing aren’t due to misunderstanding, but are due to typing too quickly. I know I mix up “their/there”, “you’re/your”, “it’s/its”, etc., but it’s not like I don’t understand the difference, I just type quickly and sometimes make a mistake.

The thing that I notice more is when people use ”‘s” for a plural, when it’s for possessive. Sometimes I do think that one is due to misunderstanding.

I just think that written English in general is going down the tank quickly, and punctuation has been the first to go. Computers have completely taken the formality out of writing properly and as usage gets even more casual, people are getting really, really lazy and out of practice.

@figbash: HI, Miss Figgie; just keep on reading The New Yorker and Harper’s; they still fly the banner high.

@Augustlan; I sometimes bored myself but at least I couched the question differently this time.

@Tink113; Of course this wasn’t directed at you personally (yet. I will wait until you are at least 16 to start being your personal language harpy.)

@gailcalled Haha thanks :)

@Tink1113:—You did look up harpy, didn’t you?

@gailcalled no…

@Tink1113: Two years from now I will yell at you. :-)

@gailcalled I won’t mind :)

@gailcalled It’s worth repeating. :)

I don’t understand it. In my creative writing class last year my teacher felt the need to ‘teach’ the class the difference between their, there, and they’re. In a creative writing class. I was sad and embarrassed that at the age of fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen, some people really needed to be retaught the difference.

@gunther, what is sad is people in their 30’s and 40’s and 50’s that don’t know the difference.