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"Unfriend" is Oxford's Word of the Year

Bart Salisbury — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:53:11 -0600

The modification of the English language, due to advances in technology, continues apace. The latest addition to the language, and “word of the year” in fact, is “unfriend.”

Unfriend, a verb that means “to remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook” is the New Oxford American Dictionary’s word of the year for 2009. A simple example of usage, according to the Dictionary: “I decided to unfriend my roommate on Facebook after we had a fight.”

Christine Lindberg, a Senior Lexicographer for Oxford’s U.S. dictionary program says the word “has both currency and potential longevity. Lindberg notes “most “un-” prefixed words are adjectives (unacceptable, unpleasant), and there are certainly some familiar “un-” verbs (uncap, unpack), but “unfriend” is different from the norm. It assumes a verb sense of “friend” that is really not used (at least not since maybe the 17th century!).” Unable to resist the pun, Lindberg adds: “Unfriend has real lex-appeal.”

Other new technology-generated words in competition for the award were “hashtag,” “intexticated,” “netbook,” “paywall,” and “sexting.”

Image Credit: Oxford University Press

'Noob' and 'Greenwashing' Race to become One Millionth English Word

Paul Lilly — Tue, 12 May 2009 07:32:03 -0500

Last year several geek-inspired words made it into the latest version of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, including 'webinar', 'netroots', 'pretexting', 'fanboy', and 'malware'. Whether Merriam-Webster choose to recognize it or not, 'noob' might soon become a real English term as well, as determined by the Global Language Monitor (GLM).

"The widespread popularity of English as a second language in Asia has brought about the most fertile period of word generation since William Shakespeare's time with new terms coined on average every 98 minutes, British newspaper The Daily Telegraph reports.

It takes using a word 25,000 times by media outlets and social networking sites for the GLM to acknowledge it, and the race is on to become the one millionth English word. Other possible entries include 'defollow,' 'defriend,' 'greenwashing,' 'and chiconomics.'

Lame Password behind Twitter Hack

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 09:22:09 -0600

A hacker who uses the pseudonym GMZ accepted responsibility for the recent Twitter hack in an IM interview to Threat Level on Tuesday. He divulged little personal details except that he is an 18-year old student on the East Coast. It is also known that he is a member of the online forum for hackers called Digital Gangster; forum members had claimed that GMZ was responsible for the hack even before the hacker owned up.

He revealed that he successfully gained access to the account of a female Twitter staffer named “Crystal.” He had serendipitously stumbled upon her account and had no idea that she was a Twitter staff member with administrative control. He then proceeded to hack her account using a dictionary attack.

The program didn’t have to break a sweat as she was using the password “happiness.” Her flimsy password coupled with Twitter’s primeval security, which allows rapid-fire log-in attempts, led to several high profile Twitter accounts, including the ones belonging to President-elect Barack Obama and Fox News, being compromised.

Image Credit: Zdnet

Malware and Other Geek Terms Infect Merriam-Webster Dictionary. "Fanboy" to Annoy New Neighbors Fanbelt and Fancied

Paul Lilly — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 14:50:22 -0500

"At one point during the webinar, 'W00ts!' were heard emanating from the conference room as Harry, a renowned Team Fortress 2 fanboy, demonstrated how to properly tea-bag an opponent."

Most English teachers would have a field day with the above sentence, but with the exception of 'tea-bag,' the rest of the terms are now officially recognized. Perhaps Merriam-Webster is undergoing a mid-life crisis, or maybe as geeks we've leveled up our ability to affect the English language. Either way, a bevy of new terms are being added to the latest version of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, and many of them could be pulled straight out of any computer forum. Among the new terms are:

webinar
netroots
pretexting
fanboy
malware

Not all the new words are technology terms, but many of them do reflect societal trends. "As soon as we see the word used without explanation or translation or gloss, we consider it a naturalized citizen of the English language," explained Peter Sokolowoski, an editor-at-large for Merriam Webster.

Also among the entries is mondegreen, "a word or phrase that results from a mishearing of something said or sung." For example, proclaiming 'Donuts make my brown eyes blue' instead of 'Don't it make my brown eyes blue,' as Crystal Gale intended. Have one of your own? Merriam-Webster's soliciting submissions until Friday, July 25, 2008, at which point they'll reveal their favorites starting the week of July 28. And of course don't forget to post it in the comments section.