Thread: They seem to be going googoo over BMW's, что это значит???

For new.....They seem to be going googoo over BMW's - что это значит??? googoo ???? шаловливый???

Cпасибо.

It must be from the Queen's Radio googoo Radio gaga song

goo-goo /ˈguˌgu/ –adjective Older Slang.
expressing adoration; foolishly amorous

Btw, BMWs.

Originally Posted by basurero

goo-goo /ˈguˌgu/ –adjective Older Slang.
expressing adoration; foolishly amorous

Btw, BMWs.

thank you, now I understand. But why BMWs while people always write BMW's? I mean plenty of American and other forums dedicated to cars and stuff.

Originally Posted by mishau_

Originally Posted by basurero

goo-goo /ˈguˌgu/ –adjective Older Slang.
expressing adoration; foolishly amorous

Btw, BMWs.

thank you, now I understand. But why BMWs while people always write BMW's? I mean plenty of American and other forums dedicated to cars and stuff.

Sorry, my mistake. I checked and it seems both are acceptable. I always was told using an apostrophe was a mistake.

Apostrophe means an omitted letter.
Applied to a noun (usually a proper name) with 's' it reflects that the following noun belongs in some way to this person (usually).

Am I right?

I think so. Then it would be logical to suggest that BMW's means 'belonging to the BMW company' while BMWs means just several BMW cars.

At least I was taught so. Of course people usually don't care but hey, we're learning languages here.

You can use an apostrophe for an abbreviation or an acronym when simply adding an 's' makes the word ambiguous, but in the case of BMW, since the initials are capitalised, there is no ambiguity. It should be BMWs, according to any style guide I have ever seen.

Yes, lots of people do write BMW's, but then lots of people use apostrophes wrongly in many contexts, and lots of people get "their/ they're/ there", or "your/ you're" muddled up, so I don't know how useful that is as a guide.

Yes. People only say that it's OK to use an apostrophe after acronyms and numbers because so many people do it. But it's wrong.

I have 10 CDs.
I have 2 BMWs.
I was born in the 1980s.

Apostrophe is for possession. The BMW's driver was a fat man = The driver of the BMW was a fat man.

Спасибо, все понял. Век живи, век не читай форумы, где пишут с ошибками.

Scotcher and TATY are correct. An apostrophe is only used when there is ambiguity as to whether the 's' belongs in the acronym or not.

I might add that they both give very good language advice -- very reliable.

Sadly, the language used in English language internet forums is generally poor. Even educated speakers tend not to proofread their posts and allow many mistakes. I don't recommend relying on them for definitive guidance.

To be fair, though, rules such as this one are not generally well known. It's usually only those make their living writing, or are language hobbyists or EFL teachers, who know these types of rules.

I don't know where I saw it, but a grammar reference I looked at said that the apostrophe is standard after acronyms or individual letters when making a plural (e.g. there are two t's in "letters").

I think no one is likely to make a big deal about it either way.

Sometimes style books don't agree with each other, but I think the generally accepted rule is as outlined above.

In your example, paulb, notice that you used a lower-case 't'. In that case, you would need an apostrophe to separate it from the lower-case 's'. However, if you said, "there are two Ts in "letter", you might not need it.

Compare:
Give the patient 10 cc's of saline solution. (10 ccs could be misunderstood)
How many ICUs do you need in one hospital? (unambiguous)

"GOOGOO" antiquated (old) slang, means excited, good thoughts, as though reduced to a child-like state of mind and speech.

By The Way (BTW) slang is "BEEMER" for BMW

Originally Posted by paulb

I don't know where I saw it, but a grammar reference I looked at said that the apostrophe is standard after acronyms or individual letters when making a plural (e.g. there are two t's in "letters").

I think no one is likely to make a big deal about it either way.

As Matroskin Kot said, that's because if you wrote "there are two ts in letters", it could be confusing.

But with BMWs, it is obvious that the S is not part of the acronym. This is especially relevant with numbers, as obviously, the letter S can't be part of a number. Thus 1990s is right, and 1990's is wrong.

I did some checking into this question. It seems that most style books (Chicago for one) advise dropping the apostrophe, however, the New York Times uses it consistently still for these situations. I know that in older publications I saw "70's" quite a bit, etc.

Seems to be something which is changing fairly recently.

It is, of course, true that using an apostrophe to form the plural of an ordinary word will make you look like a doofus.