Member's or members' ?

Members' area I think, otherwise, following your DS's logic, it should be member's areas – and even that is iffy.

I agree with you - its the area that belongs to the members.

I'm no expert but I am a pedant....I would say members' because it applies to all the members.

Of course its members'.

Doesn't it look wonderful? And I think it must take a lot of intelligence & drive to do something like that. I also doubt that anyone using it properly will notice, and you should probably be grateful that he even attempts apostrophes!

However, to answer the question:
Members' area
OR member's individual areas

However, I think it would be clearer to say "....provison of a secure area for individual members..."

Don't expect he wants to hear that!!!

Oh yes. That's lovely.

the website that is.

isn't members' possessive and member's a short way of saying member is? Always was confused.

Or - member his = member's. comma in the air to show something has been left out.

I remeber this from infants' school.

Yes!

Infants'

Infants' = infants their school = infants' school.

I have been force fed wine. This is getting difficult.

I was an English teacher and the misuse of the apostrophe still drives me mad. Someone once put forward a case for abolishing it, saying that the context was usually enough for people to understand. My last Year 11 thought this was a wonderful idea!

Oh Ariadne have you ploughed through the Pedants' Corner? I feel that most of the problem would be solved if people simply grasped that it is not necessary to add apostrophes every time they type letter 's' at the end of a word - ie more emphasis on when not to use them. Once the rules are grasped it really is so simple. If that's too complicated then yes, let's abolish it. Other languages manage without it. However the pedant in me wishes that it could be used properly as abolishing it is more or less giving in!

Has a look at tbe page, em. i agree with you that it should be members'. I can see why he's arguing for the other though, as the sentence can be read ambiguously as referring to only one member. I don't think that's what it means though.

My reading of it is that it's a secure space for as many members as wish to use it, which would make it a members' page — a page for members.

Typos!!!!

will also agree it members'

Definitely members', otherwise it sounds like an area for a secure member!