[dahart]

The rule for possessive its is backwards from all other possessives. As a native English speaker, I still have to look up “its vs it’s” because it’s confusing. I think we should drop use of its without an apostrophe, and always use it’s, and let people figure it out by context. It’s happening anyway, and it’ll become de facto accepted English grammar when enough people use “it’s” differently than the old rule.

[dTal]

It's not backwards, or an arbitrary rule. It's exactly consistent with "his" and "her", which don't use apostrophes.

[dahart]

Ah, that is a great point. Of course you know I meant that the rule of not apostrophizing its is backwards from the more common case of personal pronouns. Okay, so the possessive pronouns don’t use apostrophes and personal pronouns do. And its and whose are possessive pronouns, or possessive determiners. Is that the whole apostrophe rule? Are there any other cases or exceptions for possession? Do all indefinite pronouns use apostrophes, e.g., it’s anybody’s guess?