By John C. Heikkila (Heikki) on Thursday, December 28, 2006 - 09:21 am:
I'm flabbergasted! It was only last week my younger sis corrected me on the incorrect use of *it's*. I've been using *it's* incorrectly for at least a half century.....and also *your's*, *her's*, etc. Just seemed logical to punctuate a personal pronoun. LOL. But I salvaged my pride by sending her this from a dictionary:
PRONOUN: It's [non-standard] Its; this spelling is widely regarded as incorrect, though quite common in informal/unchecked writing.
I also added a pinch of convoluted reasoning: Since it is only widely regarded as incorrect, then it must be narrowly accepted as correct because of it's common usage. (How's that, Capt. Paul?)