3 phrases that have lost all meaning
Thanks to the amplification nature of the social web, there are some words that are essentially losing all meaning.
- Summit: There is a Cloud Summit, Mobile Summit, Home Decor Summit, Gamification Summit. Shit, I thought Summit was the peak of a mountain that was hard to climb and thus epitomized a very unique and special event.
- Crushing it: Some folks make ramen on their stoves and say they crushed it. What did you crush? Opening the noodle package? Or did you crush black peppers.
- Awesome: I see it used so often, that you would imagine this is a wonderful life and everything is perfect.
I think the nature of the social web is such that it demands attention. We are increasingly beholden to the click stream and as a result are not able to resist the hyperbole. I am pretty sure there are more words that will soon lose their meaning, impact and value.
P.S. Three years ago I was ranting about the use of fascinating, intriguing and interesting.
10 thoughts on this post
Comments are closed.
i think you’d appreciate this collection: http://storify.com/hunterwalk/overused-tech-words
Great collection Hunter !
This is true of language in general and is independent of communication channel. It is an excellent tool for detecting lack of clue about specific groups. A really great place for investigating this sort of thing is UPenn’s marvelous languagelog blog: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu
These language missteps are particularly amusing in corporatespeak and marketing:)
Thanks for sharing Steve
“Entropy” can’t be reversed! š and language entropy…definitely not.
“Literally” is the 1 word that has lost the most meaning in every day language. I’d add “Rockstar” to the list too š
I feel like Epic should have been #1 on this list. “That sandwich was epic , so epic infact I’ll post it to instagam.”
They crushed the noodles so that they aren’t so long after it has been cooked. How does that diminish meaning? Some people like their junk food noodles shorter.
Definitely have to add, “Amazing” to the list. I am so sick of hear that everything is amazing. He’s amazing, she’s amazing, we had such an amazing time at the party….Really? If everything is so damn amazing I must really live a boring life…
Disruptive, Game Changer – seems like every entrepreneur classify their product like this when in reality their “App” is neither Disruptive nor is it changing the Game. š