Don't Back Down

I admit, I've posted a few. That sentence just made me think of Frank Sinatra. Can't imagine he'd ever sing about Quizilla. Nonetheless, he isn't the point of this post. The point is that I really don't like 'em. I haven't looked, but I've posted a number of quizzes. Did one just recently about political affiliation if that's your sort of thing. But generally, I could live happily if I never saw another one so long as I live.

Luckily, an online comic seems to address each and every quiz that I've ever seen. I must say that I rarely read online-only comics, but with this bit and the other bit that I also enjoyed, I'm thinking that perhaps I should delve a little deeper. Thanks to Three-Star Dave for the pointer. Please note that my link goes to the Dork Tower site, which seems a little slow. His link goes elsewhere, so if you're getting pokey results, try it instead.

That last post reminded me of one of my pet peeves, and specifically how I was reminded of it over and over again last week while we were at Disneyland. While we were wandering through Tomorrowland, we passed the Buzz Lightyear-themed eatery. The place apparently also hosts a show or two. There's no problem with that. The problem is with the tagline. It reads Lightyear's Above the Rest.

I see two options. Either the folks who created the signage don't understand how to use the apostrophe or they do understand it and figured people wouldn't get the reference unless they spelled it out.

Option 1: Some moron thought that the plural of lightyear is lightyear's. Not the case. The plural is lightyears (no apostrophe). I don't know why people don't get this, but the apostrophe denotes possession - as in belonging to Lightyear. Not the case here. They seem to be going for a play on words, and they miss.

Option 2: Another use of the apostrophe is within contractions. When you drop letters, you use the apostrophe. Witness can and not, which contracts to can't. Perhaps they are thinking that Lightyear is would contract to Lightyear's, which I could handle, but it seems to demean the wordplay, as if they have to point it out to you so that you'll get it.

In the end, I suspect that it was just someone who didn't understand. Rather than the quite catchy Lightyears Above the Rest, they had to screw it up with an uneccessary apostrophe. You'd think Disney could afford better.

Arvind raised a good question on the Six Apart Pronet mailing list about counting entries within sub-categories.

Read "Sub-Category Counting" »