Scripsit Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn:

>> No I wouldn't. Such usage is _standard_ English, to the extent
>> anything is standard in English. Consult the applicable style guide
>> and then the Unicode Standard, which identifies the punctuation
>> marks at the level of coded characters.
>
> Well, compare

Which style guide did you consult?

> (from: Frank Herbert, Dune, book 1, chapter 4)
>
> against

Which style was used in the printed book? I haven't read it, but I think
I know the answer.

> IBTD. At least as for regular grammars, having the straight
> apostrophe only as the apostrophe and ’ only for closing single
> quote makes it a lot easier to parse the text.

And using "." only as a full stop and never as a decimal point or an
abbreviation point would make parsing even more easier. But that's
completely irrelevant here. It's not feasible to resolve ambiguities
that way, especially since the world around won't listen to your
rationalizing arguments.

The only relevant thing in HTML perspective is that ' (when
implemented at all) denotes the Ascii apostrophe and - against common
superstition of unknown origin - not the typographically and
orthographically correct apostrophe of English and other human
languages. This entity reference is best forgotten: it's almost never
needed, and should you need it, the character reference is much safer.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/