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John Posada wondered: <<I've always gone on the premise that you cannot
make a trademarked term a possessive.>>
Since when? Do you mean we have to start saying "the software produced
by Microsoft" instead of "Microsoft's software"? Do you mean we can't
say "Word's spellcheck sucks rocks"? Pshaw. This guideline violates
common usage.
<<This was corroborated to me by the SUN Style Guide. I quote: "Never
use trademarks in the possessive or the plural." (page 62) Even in the
MMOS, page 239, it says "Because legally a trademark is an adjective,
Microsoft trademarks should not be used as verbs or nouns or in the
possessive or plural form.">>
Pace Sun (and my dear friend Janice Gelb, who co-wrote the guide), this
advice is nonsense _for people working outside the company that is
trying to protect the trademark_. You won't find any journalist who
observes this advice; check out PC Magazine, for instance. You can
certainly write your way around the problem (e.g., "the Word
spellchecker" instead of "Word's spellchecker"), but why bother?
As for MMOS, don't get me started. All the advice I've seen quoted from
that particular style guide has struck me as at best arbitrary and at
worst outright wrong. The criticisms I've read about it in reviews by
experienced editors who are authorities in their field (e.g., Don Bush)
are pretty damning. Maybe I should read it myself some day, but I can't
imagine shelling out the bucks for something that I've seen so
resoundingly panned by experts whose opinions I trust.
Where this advice does make important sense is if you're working in the
company that owns the trademark. In that case, your advertising and
your copyright statements should be rigid about this approach. As the
trademark holder, you have to treat your own trademark with some
respect. However:
So, I always thought it was correct to write "Microsoft's", but not
"Microsoft Word's"... I thought so, until I came across numerous
instances on the Microsoft web site where it states that "Microsoft is
a trademark", yet on the same page, uses "Microsoft's".
I think that pretty much tells you everything you need to know, doesn't
it? If they don't even follow their own style guide, why should you?
FWIW, Sun's own Web site displays the occasional "Sun's", though they
do seem to be careful to use such things as "Java" exclusively as
adjectives (e.g., "the Java environment" rather than "Java's
environment"). While I don't object to that style, proscribing the
alternative ("Java's reputation is excellent") is going too far.
--Geoff Hart ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca
(try geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com if you don't get a reply)
