The first example is correct. Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage prefers it, using the example of "mind your p's and q's."
An apostrophe is not used when making a word plural, and, increasingly, also not used when making a number plural. But in the case of an individual letter the apostrophe is still required, particularly when its absence would cause confusion. In this case, "is" is a word, so the absence of an apostrophe could give momentary misdirection to the reader.
The site referenced by Anonymous coward says that both are correct, as porsche notes. But if not wrong—and it is—the double quotation mark construction is, at the very least, inelegant.
I prefer the first one. It's the one I was taught, and the second one looks noisy and hard to read, to me. I agree that there may not be a hard-and-fast rule on this, however.
In response to Ivy, with respect: if the letters are uppercase, then "dotting the i" has no meaning; neither does crossing the upper-case "t" have any. No dot in the first instance, no crossing in the second.
The apostrophes look better than the quotation marks. In response to Ivy: notice that if you pluralize a capital I at the beginning of a sentence, it looks like the word "is".
osghaemm
February 15, 2011, 4:37pm
The first one...I hope :-)
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fahadsadah
February 15, 2011, 5:09pm
The second - see http://apostrophe.me
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fahadsadah
February 15, 2011, 5:10pm
I'm sorry, I wasn't aware that site had died. It's http://theoatmeal.com/comics/apostrophe
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porsche
February 15, 2011, 10:57pm
To "Anonymous coward": you said that the second one is correct, but the link you posted says both are correct!!
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douglas.r.bryant
February 16, 2011, 1:20am
The first example is correct. Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage prefers it, using the example of "mind your p's and q's."
An apostrophe is not used when making a word plural, and, increasingly, also not used when making a number plural. But in the case of an individual letter the apostrophe is still required, particularly when its absence would cause confusion. In this case, "is" is a word, so the absence of an apostrophe could give momentary misdirection to the reader.
The site referenced by Anonymous coward says that both are correct, as porsche notes. But if not wrong—and it is—the double quotation mark construction is, at the very least, inelegant.
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ivytan
February 16, 2011, 1:46am
The first is correct but only if the letters are lowercase. If they are uppercase, then it should say Is and Ts. The quotation marks are unnecessary.
Source: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/621/01/
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fmerton
February 16, 2011, 12:13pm
I agree; what is the point of the quotation marks. (Rhetorical question so no question mark) (Incomplete sentence so no period)
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scyllacat
February 16, 2011, 5:45pm
I prefer the first one. It's the one I was taught, and the second one looks noisy and hard to read, to me. I agree that there may not be a hard-and-fast rule on this, however.
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douglas.r.bryant
February 17, 2011, 3:45am
In response to Ivy, with respect: if the letters are uppercase, then "dotting the i" has no meaning; neither does crossing the upper-case "t" have any. No dot in the first instance, no crossing in the second.
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cgtay33
February 19, 2011, 7:56pm
The apostrophes look better than the quotation marks. In response to Ivy: notice that if you pluralize a capital I at the beginning of a sentence, it looks like the word "is".
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ivytan
February 21, 2011, 7:04am
@Douglas, yeah I know but I'm not talking about the meaning of the sentence but the usage of apostrophes for capital letters vs lowercase letters.
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porsche
February 21, 2011, 8:00pm
This has been discussed in some detail already. See:
http://painintheenglish.com/?p=1521
and
http://painintheenglish.com/?p=1600
Also, mentioned in passing in quite a few posts on this site.
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