ATTN: Copyeditors and Grammar Fiends

Trouble is, our house style dictates that companies are always cold and clinical singular entities - "Apple has just released the iPhone 4", "the BBC has shelved plans to close 6Music" etc - which doesn't sit quite right with "whose" suddenly imbuing them with a soul!

Wait a minute, why are you dragging singular/plural into this? 'Whose' and 'has' are both singular. And 'has' is not particularly impersonal - 'John has declared his undying love for Jane'.

Hmm. Had a quick google, and this seems to help with the problem a little: http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-who-that.aspx

It gives an example that makes me think 'whose' is definitely right in this particular case:

That is the company whose managers fled the country.
That is the table whose legs were damaged last week.

With nonrestrictive clauses, you can also do this:

"That is my father's table, the legs of which were damaged last week."

Yeah, I wasn't saying that was the only way to structure the sentence, just that it is a plausibly correct way, and thus supports the idea that one can do the same to companies without negating house style.

Yes, you can use 'whose' with things as well as people.

Consider:

"A pair of boots appears" vs "A pair of boots appear." Which is accepted? The latter sounds much less awful but the stupid former is probably right, right? Love you, copyeditors/grammar fiends. <3

Should specify: I am actually trying to say that they poof into existence, not "appear" like "...appears flattering," or something.

First one is right, sorry. You could go with "Two boots appear"

So I would seriously say "A pair of boots appears on the man" (not that I'd ever say this, but, you know... you copyedit some weird shit sometimes)?

Looks that way to me. "A pair" = singular.

Which is better to describe some men and some women: Individuals "of both sexes" or "of either sex"? Isn't "either sex" the one that makes it sound like I mean hermaphrodites?

yes

well actually: either sex sounds like you mean one or the other in some kind of binary. i suppose "individuals of both sexes" could refer to a room full of hermaphrodites.

but i think it would be clear if you used "both sexes"

good 'nuff

Italian doctorlolz: "either sexes"

"men and women" does the job

itt grammarian intersex discrimination

Employees of T*******r seem to have their mental faculties fully intact, yet the company etc.

Is there a San Francisco equivalent of 'Londoner' or 'Glaswegian'?

Like San Francisco-ite or something?

As in, "The project of Wooden Shjips guitarist/vocalist Erik “Ripley” Johnson and fellow San Francisco resident Sanae Yamada, Moon Duo..."

Just wondering...

san fransciscan?

I'd say "San Franciscan" and Wikipedia also says "Demonym: San Franciscan", thus teaching me a new word (which it concedes is not in any dictionaries)

but as a pasty Britisher I'd defer to a real American on this, just thought I'd reply while we're still at a PDT-unfriendly time of day

(xp)

Thanks very much.

I also like 'demonym', that's a new word for me too, and was the word I was wanting when trying to phrase the original question more elegantly.

I think you're good to go:

"san franciscan" site:sfgate.com*
About 11,000 results (0.25 seconds)

*Website of the San Francisco Chronicle

Dark and Stormy (the drink) – is the plural:
Dark & Stormies
or
Dark & Stormys
?

Abbott! Have you been surreptitiously reading the Chicago thread?

I just pluralized this drink in a post YESTERDAY. I went with Dark and Stormies. BUT I did briefly hesitate about it, not just the pluralization but whether cocktails should even be capitalized.

I have been so thrown on uncommon pluralization after I heard people on "Coast to Coast AM" call a number of Bigfoot organisms "Bigfoots," not "Bigfeet."

haha i'd probably lean toward the former myself - surely "bigfoot" is an individual lil dude, not a species?

"In Canada, for every Rush, there are at least three Gordon Lightfeet."

Someone please spot-check my numerical logic here, because something is making me feel crazy. I'm going to change the content, but I'm looking at a stat being used in the following way:

43% of teenage boys are more likely than the average person to drink Teenage Boy Soda!

This strikes me as a terrible statistic -- doesn't it actually mean that a majority (57%) of teenage boys are LESS (or just equally) likely than the average person to enjoy the soda? That fewer than half of them are on the above-average side of the distribution? And yet the stat is presented with such confidence and glee that it's making me question myself: am I missing some trick of medians or deviations that somehow makes this stat a good thing?

pretty sure that's just a terrible statistic. sounds like it's derived from some sort of iffy "how likely are you to do x in the next week" survey results.

Always sad to see the NY Times screw it up:

"Growing up in rural Montana, Jere was drawn to the paintings in seed catalogs the way other kids poured over Mad magazine."

It may not have been evident from the context, but the other kids were pouring imitation maple syrup over those Mad magazines.

"nearly one in five americans believe" or "nearly one in five americans believes"

The former.

"nearly one in five americans believe" = 16,800 google hits
"nearly one in five americans believes" = googlewhack

"the same number of people have had a ghostly experience" or "the same number of people has had a ghostly experience"

Although singular is more logical, it looks odd, therefore I would go with plural.

both are acceptable go with the more widely used one

Is it true to say that an indeterminate number is always plural, even if there's a strong implication that the number is one?

happy enough with that, yeah, though context would help

i use this trick all the time when talking about previous lovers for instance

redknapp apparently willing to listen to offers for

wilson palacios.

now, he's not had a great few months but that's absolute madness.

can someone give me a percentages refresher? if someone says "we're 50% more popular now than we were last year" then that means that if, say, 8 people voted for them last year, 12 did this year? because 4 is 50% of 8 and then you add it to the total? so they're 50% MORE popular than they were last year but equally you could say their popularity is 150% of what it was last year? now that i'm saying it everything makes sense but i swear this stuff confuses the hell out of me sometimes

that all makes sense, unlike me posting spurs transfer rumours

your first reading is right I think ? 150% to me would mean 20 ppl voted

20 is 150% of 13.3

i think both tracer's readings are the same?

yep

50% more = 150% of