It’s just a misplaced apostrophe.
Seriously. Look, I know it’s wrong. You know it’s wrong. We’re in agreement. Awesome! Go us!
Heck, there’s a good chance that the person who typed the son of a bitch knows it’s wrong, too, and was just in a hurry, or is a poor typist. Or maybe they don’t know better. Maybe they’re not so good with apostrophes. Homonyms may trouble them in general. It’s hard to say, at a glance.
But, okay? Okay. We’re agreed. An apostrophe was misused. It was, you are correct in noting to yourself, a case of apostrophe misuse. Good eye! Have a cookie. You are apostrophically observant.
Now: shut your piehole. The intended meaning was almost certainly clear from context, rogue apostrophe bedamned. Nobody gains anything from you pointing it out, except for weariness. You are not a special agent of the Ministry of Punctuation. You have not been appointed by God to go out and spread the Good Word. There is no dearth of pedantry from which your tiresome corrections are a welcome relief. You are not as funny as Bob the Angry Flower. Unless you are a copy-editor, and what you’re doing right now is editing copy, your having bothered to contribute to the subject chalks up as a net loss for all involved. For crap’s sake, hush.
jessamyn Said,
July 10, 2008 @ 11:26 am
what he said.
chronic Said,
July 10, 2008 @ 5:23 pm
Your right!
dg Said,
July 11, 2008 @ 1:49 am
what she sayed.
yath Said,
July 11, 2008 @ 11:59 am
Why don’t you just fix the apostrophe, instead of yelling when people point out the error?
Secretariat Said,
July 11, 2008 @ 1:07 pm
What.
It's Raining Florence Henderson Said,
July 12, 2008 @ 11:44 am
Apostate!!!
That One Guy Said,
August 3, 2008 @ 11:35 am
I can’t possibly take this article seriously. There’s an extra space in there.
Danila Said,
August 3, 2008 @ 1:11 pm
this is an oasis in a pedantic dessert
it’s just a misplaced s
Josh Millard . com » Live Apostrophree or Die Said,
August 12, 2008 @ 12:39 pm
[...] Now I just need to drum up a few million to leverage a LAN/proxy implementation of my counterstrategy. [...]
The Ridger Said,
August 23, 2008 @ 6:10 am
Yes. Preach it, brother. It’s a spelling mistake, not the barbarians at the gate. Fix it if you can, but don’t go on and on about it.
The Ridger Said,
August 23, 2008 @ 6:21 am
Let me clarify: “desert” and “dessert” are both nouns. They fill the same syntactic role in a sentence. It’s plausible that one could come up with a sentence in which they could either one be used.
However, you’ll note they are pronounced differently as well, while its, it’s or your, you’re aren’t.
If there really were sentences where either it is / you are or of it / of you could be used, then doubtless we’d have either different possessives or different contractions. As it is, you’re unlikely to be confused for more than a word or two - just as when you hear the sentence spoken - and that hardly even qualifies for garden-path status, let alone structural ambiguity.
Misplaced apostrophes are mistakes. They’re not worth the amount of time and emotion some people spend on them.
YMMV, and obviously does.