Correct use of hyphen to prefix multiple words with one

Question

I wrote:

An open -source and -society loving person

and had this corrected by a native English speaker to

An open-source-and-society loving person

Which to me changes the meaning of the phrase. The first one is meant to be short-hand for prefixing both "source" and "society" with "open", while the second one does not seem to connect "society" with "open".

Is either of the forms more correct than the other? Should it be written differently all together?

Answer 1

The use of hyphens in my initial sentance is called Suspended hyphens.

From wikipedia:

A suspended hyphen (also referred to as a "hanging hyphen" or "dangling hyphen") may be used when a single base word is used with separate, consecutive, hyphenated words which are connected by "and", "or", or "to". For example, nineteenth-century and twentieth-century may be written as nineteenth- and twentieth-century.

Answer 2

I'd say that what you wrote is clear to me but not clear to all native speakers. Which means that you need to change it. I'd write it An open-source- and open-society-loving person. To be absolutely sure that no one will misunderstand, though, don't omit any words: An open-source-loving and open-society-loving person. It probably doesn't sound as good if it reads A {person who loves / lover of} open-source and open-society, and it may not even mean the same thing. You'll have to be the judge of that.

EDIT: Adding how to use the hyphen (You're right, ΜετάEd, I should've added that info)

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/compounds.htm

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/ is an excellent site for grammar and writing mechanics rules.

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/marks/hyphen.htm

The basic rule is to avoid confusion by hyphenating terms that belong together. Sometimes that leads to long hyphenated compounds such as the one the native speaker who misunderstood your sentence provided. In this case, "open source" and "open society" are compounds: ADJECTIVE+NOUN that function as an adjective modifying loving. That makes all three words a single compound adjective phrase that modifies the noun person. Therefore, two hyphens are required: one after open and one before loving. It is, in essence, a single adjective because that's how it functions. However, there is a hierarchy here: open-source is one level higher than loving:

open-source

       \

        loving

              \

               person

Because loving is identical in both phrases, the first instance can be deleted as long as the hyphen that precedes it isn't deleted (this hanging hyphen [indicating a suspended compound] shows that a word has been elided).

Some experts believe that a hyphen isn't necessary even for an open (unhyphenated) compound, e.g., fish oil, baby oil, and suntan oil [suntan is a closed compound (two words fused into one, like today)], because they're common terms and, therefore, clear to the reader: a fish oil lover, a baby oil lover, a suntan oil lover. It all depends on context and outcome: if readers misunderstand, the hyphen is necessary. A baby oil lover could mean either a baby-oil lover or a baby oil-lover, depending on context. Most of the time, though, it won't be ambiguous.

In the sentence Bob's a high school student, almost no one would misunderstand the meaning that Bob is a 9th-12th grader, so no hyphen is required between high and school.

I'm sure that I claimed here a while back that native speakers of English will say or write just about anything and claim that it's idiomatic, correct, and acceptable just because they said or wrote it and just because they're native speakers. Here's an example. The native speaker you asked didn't understand what your sentence wants to say, but he's sure that his revision is correct. OTOH, because he didn't understand, perhaps the writing is the problem because it didn't work for him. You need a bigger audience to arrive at any conclusion. A sample of one or three just doesn't provide enough information.

Rule of thumb about writing: The best way to write anything is so that it accomplishes exactly what you want it to accomplish. Sometimes that means clarity and brevity, and sometimes it means murky ambiguity, and sometimes it means pure nonsense:

Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

(From Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll, 1872)

You can't trust all native speakers to know what they're talking about when you ask them about English, especially that tricky stuff with high-fenses 'n' low-fenses 'n' all. You can't trust all authorities to know either. All you can trust is the outcome: Does it work? Do people understand what your sentence (or longer discourse) is intended to communicate (whether it be solely information or information with an attitude or just a feeling)?