ATTN: Copyeditors and Grammar Fiends

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I think I've only seen "janky" in print, not in conversation. But I didn't hear "hinky" until college.

I say "janky" all the time, and I am Midwestern.

i have never heard janky! while 'dude' and 'awesome' transcend international borders, so many many words don't make it across

'dude i don't know man i totally deked outta that scene before it got all heavy'
has prob been said by me

"Leaving" is a gerund, "leavings" is a noun for what has been left.
Through rigorous daylight-saving activities, we will create a savings of daylight.

???
I get the 'leaving'-as-gerund part: Leaving your vegetables is lazy and bad for your health. I could imagine a noun 'leavings' for what has been left, e.g. He put his plate on the floor and let the dog eat his leavings, but I've never heard such a word - we would say 'leftovers'. But you could still never say 'a leavings'! The dog ate a leavings from my plate, but ignored a leavings which was on my wife's plate. That's so wrong.

Exactly the same with 'save':
Saving money is a good idea in the long run. = ok
The cost of the new kitchen ate into his savings. = ok
He put some money away each month and built up a savings. = wrong, wrong, wrong!

But you could still never say 'a leavings'!

It could work. 'An innings' is perfectly OK, over here at least :)

NBS, you would never say "a leavings" because LEAVINGS IS PLURAL. You'd never say "a tomatoes" either.

So is it "less savings" or "fewer savings"?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

Less, of course. 25% is less of a savings than 50%.

Ah.

fewer.

but i can totally understand why laurel (and presumably nabisco) would say "less".

(and presumably several million other americans, natch.)

If you're talking about savings in a bank, then surely "less". You don't count such savings one by one.

i do. "one, two, thr ... oh. two."

less savings fine less of a savings mental-sounding

NBS, you would never say "a leavings" because LEAVINGS IS PLURAL. You'd never say "a tomatoes" either.

That's exactly my point. That's why you would never say "a savings". Nabisco suggested 'leavings' and 'savings' had the same properties.

I have read an argument for using 'less' with percentages, I think something to do with it expressing a quantity of a whole. Less than 10% of universities, not fewer than 10% of universities.

I think either of those could be all right - in the first one, the 'less' applies to the percentage, and in the second it is 'fewer' universities. But, yes, footballers would not be allowed to give 'fewer than 110%' though it'd be funny if one said that.

your guyes' savingses' grammar theories are less convincing than a few things

I've no idea what anyone's on about anymore.

"Fewer than 110%" makes no sense, but "fewer than 10% of universities" does, because although we might not know it, 10% of universities is a fixed, definite number, so actually we're saying "fewer than 35" or whatever.

"A savings" is clearly madness but if British English has similar plural-sounding singulars then perhaps that's madness too.

If you think it's all got incomprehensible you've got another thing coming.

"Fewer than half of all Americans support the Iraq war"

"Less than half of all Americans support the Iraq war"

Fewer sounds a bit strange to me. Which makes me think it shouldn't be used with percentages either.

Ahhh a little help from the American Heritage Dict:

1. savings Money saved: a bank account for savings.
2. savings (used with a sing. verb) Usage Problem An amount of money saved: a rebate that yielded a savings of $50.

Usage Note: Traditionalists state that one should use the form a saving when referring to an amount of money that is saved. Indeed, that is the form English speakers outside of the United States normally use. In the United States the plural form a savings is widely used with a singular verb (as in A savings of $50 is most welcome); nonetheless, 57 percent of the Usage Panel find it unacceptable.

this is about that indian internet salesperson on that prank phone show, right?

internet service providings making the savings.

I know this is just Not How Language Works, but I am fine with "fewer" and a percentage based on the root:

- fewer than 50% of Americans have testicles
- fewer than 50 (of 100) Americans have testicles

Umm I guess note also that you'd say "50% of individuals have," hence "fewer" -- versus like "50% of the oil is," hence the corresponding "less"

See, I would recommend "less than half" per a half being a discrete thing by itself, but then check out the issue that raises with "support" -- "less than half of all Americans supports the war"? -- so possibly the best workaround is something like

Less than half of the American public supports the war.

If you are doing this in the United States:

501.433.1037

Please stop. The correct form is (501) 433-1037, and I don't have the time nor patience to copyedit such trivial stuff.

Hmmm, Google seems in two minds:

Results 1 - 10 of about 5,490 for "less than 50 percent of americans".
Results 1 - 10 of about 4,540 for "fewer than 50 percent of americans".

On the other hand, definite victory for "less" with "half":

Results 1 - 10 of about 905 for "fewer than half of americans".
Results 1 - 10 of about 21,800 for "less than half of americans".

Half is a singular thing, you can either have more than it or less than it. "Fewer than half" would require multiple wholes.

And percentage is a fractional thing...

the figure itself is "less than 50%", so when you're referring to the percentage itself then that's ok- ie the number of people that believe x is less than 50%

that figure then refers to a subset of a group, so when you talk about what that 50% of people believe then you're then talking about a number of individuals- is when it becomes normal (outside US, evidently) to use 'fewer than'.

i think?

This makes sense to me

Yep, makes sense to me too.

Is there anything wrong with this sentence?

Weren't they the highest-selling games last week?

It feels like there is, but I think I'm just being paranoid. It is a bit awkward, but...

Think I'd leave out the -

Keep the hyphen. It sounds funny cos 'biggest-' or 'best-selling- are more common. 'Highest-grossing' too.

A game can sell the best, but can it really sell the highest?

It could at an auction.

This question is just for personal edification, not work-involved: apostrophe-s should never mark plurals, even of acronyms or abbreviations, right? E.g. multiple Nintendo Entertainment Systems should be NESes, not NES's, and snotty kids who don't dance to dance music are IDMers, not IDM'ers?

only exception for apostrophe plurals is single letters. Example: Oakland A's.

I had three C's on my report card and my dad flipped.

that is my feeling on it, yeses
xpost
hrm i see the point in that

I don't think, grammatically, there's ever an excuse to say IDMers OR IDM'ers. I'd say IDM fans. Or IDM nerds. Or something.

guys i am actually an official copyeditor again
one of many not-so-harsh realities dawning on me today

People who make it are clearly IDMians, though

You're telling me that it's "c'ing on her t's," not "cing on her ts"? That feels wrong and dirty.

ESPECIALLY in that case, Leee, as you are, you know, abbreviating those two words (in that case, c'ing on her t's is short for chomping on her tomatos, so apostrophes are needed)