OT: Language Abuse

[Robert Bushman]

On Sat, 6 Jul 2002, Voltage Spike wrote:

> I would also add another term to the list that has been growing in popularity:
> copy protection.  I tend to associate the term with protecting my right to
> copy rather than its true meaning (a mechanism which protects the author's
> rights concerning the copy).  In fact, many people interpret the term this
> way.  The end result is that people tend to accept copy protection without
> thinking about the true meaning.  How many people would buy that new CD with
> brand new "copy prevention" technology? :-)

While we're at it, how 'bout these:
Warning to all readers: I am about to attempt to slaughter your sacred
cow. If I missed yours, I apologize. I was going to inline this, but some
of it may be pretty offensive. If you can't take a joke, don't click
through:
http://traxel.com/doc/market-speak.txt

Market-speakers are bad, but so are semantic cops. I use words as they are
used in common practice. My intent is to communicate, so that I can
advance my ideas. Synchronously redefining the language is beyond the
scope of my objectives.

Re: Derek:
The point is to communicate, which requires coding effort by the
transmitter and decoding effort by the receiver. My objective is not
linguistic in nature, so attempts to assault each word individually will
be quite successful. IMO, it is both more interesting and more rewarding
to make the effort to understand, rather than spending all your effort
criticizing.

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