Slashdot Mirror
Podcasting Officially a Word
goldseries writes "The BBC is reporting that the New Oxford American Dictionary is
adding podcasting to the dictionary. A year ago it was rejected because not enough people were reading it, but, in a ode to the speed of technology's growth, it is being declared the word of the year. Podcasting has been in the Oxford Dictionary of English since last summer. Podcast beat out words such as lifehack and rootkit for inclusion in the dictionaries. I guess no one needs to know what a rootkit is."
I can't believe podcasting got into the dictionary before rootkit did!
:D
Hmm, is this also a first post... if so, it's my first one ever!
It may be a word now, but will anyone still be using it 50 years from now?
I'll stick with audio download.
> ... but we found that not enough people were using it, or were even familiar with the concept ...
Thanks to Sony and the like, there are more than enough people running a rootkit, so include the word already...
Needed in the Japanese version for the Sony employees (music/CD division).
It's just a webcast you can save.
There's nothing particularly special about it.
My pics.
I'm not really sure to know what Podcasting means, but it's a word only related to iTunes/iPod right? I mean, sounds weird, why would the name of a function of some product be added to the dictionnary?
You just got troll'd!
Now noone will ever know what a rootkit is.
FYI, if you anagram Podcast, you can come up with 'Stop a CD'
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
I always wondered why other technical words such as "bollocks" never made it in..
"Sweet llamas of the Bahamas !"
..you just can't see it ;)
It's just a fad word for downloading audio from the Internet. This pretty much summarizes it. How did it get added to the dictionary so fast? It's not even generic - it was created in part based on a modern day product. If anything, it should be going into a slang reference guide not a dictionary.
I guess no one needs to know what a rootkit is."
No, no non-techies should have to know about this. They ought to live in a world where it is ok to listen to a CD you bought legally in a normal shop.
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
I guess Microsoft employees can now stop calling them blogcasts
Podcasting... Can I throw up now?
It is about time that podcasting aka Personal On Demand Casting is added to the dictionary. Though I haven't yet managed to find any podcasts. Everytime I try to find one, I end up with MP3 files, sometimes a video file. Well, perhaps someday I'll manage to download a podcast file.
- Raynet --> .
"I guess no one needs to know what a rootkit is."
:)
aww, that's cute, do I see a little bit of envy in there?
B.
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
Dictionaries never were and never will be a source of information about the english language, expecially not about what words /don't/ exist.
if you think to yourself "He can't possibly have an argument to support that statement!" You probably misread the statement.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
I always thought "podcasting" sounded like a euphemism for masturbation.
Read any good sonnets lately?
What is a lifehack? Lifehack is a doubleplus ungood word. The person who invented it must have ownlife. Lifehack wordmaker not bellyfeel ingsoc.
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
In the USA, words are created by companies.
Million Dollar Screenshot
Podcasting has to be the most useless word ever. Last year we were "downloading audio", this year we're "listening to podcasts" - right.
Podcast...Blogcast whatever...there is no distinction between the information provided and what it is delivered on. Hence no need to ad it to the dictionary. Just an example of great marketing at Apple. Personally I cringe every time I hear the term podcast because it is generally being made by a comentator on mainstream media referring to an archive of his show.
It's quite telling that the most popular podcasts on itunes are all 'mainstream' broadcasts just repackaged as MP3. Postcasting is becoming just timeshifted radio...
We have some excellent radio stations in the UK, that are better quality than 99% of podcasts, so I can't see podcasting getting popular here. In the US it's different - from what I hear they basically have no good radio at all.
Well, it has not made it into the Oxford Compact Dictionary, nor anywhere else on their AskOxford site.
It is such a useless buzz word that nobody will use in a year or so. Whats next ? slashdot ?
Come on, surely everyone knows what a nonesevent is! That word deserves to be in the dictionary!
The Travelling Adventurer
Am I the only one who's never heard of this term?
-- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
...thank god podcasting is "officially a word". Now I can utter it in speech without fear of spontaneously combusting because I hate it when that happens.
- Toby
This is the first time I've posted a MOD PARENT UP post... but this one certainly needs to be done. I'm absolutely sick of terms made up by marketing people, especially one so product specific as this.
sig.
The caption "Chris Moyles is the BBC's most popular podcast" should read "Chris Moyles is a fat cunt with no discernable talent".
I dunno if I would mod that flame bait, judging from the pic in the article, OP seems pretty informative to me. Really gives meaning to the phrase "has a face for the radio."
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10.
Not so the US, but the word 'root' in Australia is slang to have sex.
Rootkit - sounds like some sort of fuckfest preparation guide!
Dictionaries just report on current usage of groups of letters that have meaning. They don't officiate anything. That's one of the problems with things like acrostics and Scrabble, they don't care if things are actually words or not, just that they are in the dictionary. There is a vast portion of language that manifests itself in words that has never and will never be in the dictionary.
sig.
Yeah, but so is buttfuck. Also: cocksucker, cumslut, jizm. For that matter Tom Arnold is considered an actor and George Bush is the president. You can call yourself anything you want!
I doubt it.
Surely there will be more sophisticated audio distribution methods in the future...
But a vacuum cleaner is an entirely different thing... a product that started as a service industry and was revolutionized by turning it into a portable appliance for home use.
Vacuums for the removal of particulate matter from air are a revolution in fluid dynamics and basic application of scientific principles.
Podcasts are... FUCKING AUDIO FILES ON A WEBLOG.
Durrrrrr....
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
The people who need to know what a rootkit is will find out quickly enough, in the dictionary or not.
Because, really, I didn't know until I looked it up:
Dictionary.com Main Entry: podcasting
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: the Web-based broadcast of music which works with software that automatically detects new files and is accessed by subscription
Etymology: 2004; iPod + broadcasting
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
.. to the iPod and most other mp3-players not having any radio tuner or internet access when you are on the road.
When iPods and other mp3-players have constant Internet access, "podcasting" will be about as common as people taping radio feeds on their cassette deck to play later. Hardly something requiring a new word.
Actually, the OED and its ilk are about tracking what words are actually used in English. The words in them are directly based not on what "should" or "should not" be in a dictionary, but what words are used in everything from everyday speech to literature. The OED got started with individuals sending in notecards with a word and a pointer to an example of its use.
who asks what the fuck is a lifehack?!???
#!/
to keep 'rootkit' out of the dictionary this year?
This sig donated to Pater. Long live
Yet another 10-letter word! Kick@$$! Now maybe we can get that 10 Letter Acrostic Puzzle solved without controversy!
3 7224&tid=99&tid=186&tid=208&tid=4
http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/12/03/2
Sugapablo
The point of the grandparent is that "rootkit" is a fairly old term.
"Streamed" goes to a program/plugin and isn't saved, "downloaded" goes to disk.
The world will rue the day I get that word put into the dictionary. Now if only the iFlog was the hot item this christmas.
Congratulations Slashdot, yet again you've fallen victim to the Apple marketing machine. Podcasting wasn't invented by Apple, they just want you to think it was. Even Oxford terms it "a digital recording of a radio broadcast or similar program, made available on the Internet for downloading to a personal audio player". The word itself is stupid; you don't need an iPod to podcast (even though many are going to think the 'pod' part is refering to an iPod, it means any portable media player) and you don't have to do it with a live broadcast (it can be prerecorded, and stored on the device). It's amazing how gullable people are. In a few years, everyone is probably going to be talking about how Apple innovated this, when really, they did no such thing. All they did was pull together a bunch of technologies invented by other people who won't get credit for it, and called it their own.
If Microsoft had done this, everyone would be screaming about it.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
Smurf #1: Hey, did you have a good time last night? Smurf #2: Smurf-tacular! Smurf #1: Yeah, I saw you leave with Smurfette. Smurf #2: Oh man, as soon as we got out of the bar, she started smurfing me. Smurf #1: Shut the Smurf up! Smurf #2: Yeah! Smurf #1: Right in the Smurfing parking lot? Smurf #2: Smurf-Yeah! Smurf #1: Oh! That is freaking Smurf!
Well, it is a perfectly cromulent word after all.
The days of the digital watch are numbered.
I feel like throwing up!
If it's dead, you killed it.
Don't misunderestimate the power of podcasting! It clearly embetters the english language.
If something I said can be interpreted two ways, and one of the ways makes you sad or angry, I meant the other one.
You are quite correct. Podcasting is a slightly misleading term, that seems to give undue credit to Appple. But, from a marketting standpoint, it's a great word (which is why it is used so much). It's short, it's catchy, it's fairly understandable (although it tends to lead people to think iPods are the only audio player the technology works with), and most importantly, it relates to ideas people already are familiar with and use on a daily basis.
Most people listen to broadcasts, so listening to 'podcasts' is an easy conceptual jump - it seems like a natural extension of what people already do. Proposed alternatives like 'blogcast' or 'audio blog' are unfamiliar to most people, because most people aren't used to reading blogs (a lot of people have no idea what the term even means), and view blogs as different than broadcast programming.
I might be intersted in listening to 'digital broadcasts', but not to listening to 'audioblogs'. It's a difference in perception of what a blog is (someones personal 'web-diary', or professional opinion page), and what a broadcast is.
Unfortunately, for awhile, I think we are going to be stuck with this term. If someone can come up with an alternative word, that is just as catchy, and wants to start popularizing it, by all means, be my guest. I prefer terms that are vendor-neutral, when talking about a technology.
Meh.
I'm still waiting for stuponfucious to make it in.
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Could you please clarify the difference between clicking on a link to an MP3 file and a Podcast? I'm serious, this piece of technology has slipped by me and I really don't know what a "podcast" is.
/
For example, SciFi has some Battelstar Galactica "podcasts" here:
http://www.scifi.com/battlestar/downloads/podcast
But they are just MP3 files. They do have a nice link about "learn more about podcasts" that I just read, and I guess what it amounts to is to turn an MP3 file into a "podcast" you need a special piece of software that goes and checks for updated MP3 files from time to time? They mention an "RSS" feed? This is something else I've never used.
Could someone tell me more about Podcasts? Thanks.
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
...is that like some kind of iPod?
Except for the "Slashdot crowd," portable music devices are iPods. People who don't have computers know what iPods are. To most people, "MP3 player" sounds like a genericism, like "correction fluid" or "polystyrene foam."
The US free market: two halves of a government-granted duopoly are free to set the market price.
Thank you for posting this, I was going to do it but decided to check if someone else beat me to it. Of course, you are only partially correct. When speaking of dictionaries, there are two types: descriptive and prescriptive. The OED is descriptive, it only describes the current state of the language as observed by readers. The other type, prescriptive, tries to dictate correct usage, although I'm not aware of any examples off hand. Not all dictionaries report on current usage, but the ones scholars use most do.
What I don't get is, if Podcasting is "Casting to your pod" then what is Broadcasting?
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I thought your post was more insightful, than the flamebait tag it got, because I often feel that geeks are unable to successfully portray their "turf" against mass media advertising.
All hackers are considered crackers.
All computers are considered windows/apples.
All mp3 players are considered ipods.
All the dictionary entry really proves is that mass media advertisers can create more hype than geeks can. *shrug*
The OED hardly counts as a standard dictionary with the vocab from your local English newspaper. It attempts to encompass /all/ English spoken and written anywhere. This is the dictionary with "d'oh" in it.
"It embraces not only the standard language of literature and conversation, whether current at the moment, or obsolete, or archaic, but also the main technical vocabulary, and a large measure of dialectal usage and slang."
...so that Adam Curry's name doesn't mysteriously appear in the definition.
The English language doesn't care if a word is "worthy" or not fools! If people use a word, and obviously they use 'podcast' or nobody would even understand this story, then it's part of the language, end of story!
Haven't you got anything better to do than read my stupid signature?
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
There is no way for an English word to "officially" become a word.
Languages like French and Spanish which have an official language academy that supposedly dictates what is or is not in the language could make a (very dubious) claim to officiating words.
No such thing exists for the English language. It's a stupid idea, anyway. 'podcast' was a word the minute Apple coined it. If you and I both know what it means, and communicate with it, it's a word. Period. When your grade school teacher told you "ain't wasn't a word" she/he was full of shit. Which is why the retort was "ain't ain't a word and I ain't s'posed to say it." Funny, considering 3/11 of that sentence is composed of a non-word, it's still completely clear what it means...
-- Hello_World.c: 17 Errors, 31 Warnings
It's not official, it's Oxford. Even then, they consider it to be an addition to the American language. Growing more distant from English, American includes words like labor, favor, behavior, and now, if you take Oxford as the ultimate authority, "podcast."
It's commonly accepted, but it's no more a word than Asprin, Kleenex, Band-aid, etc... It's a commercial catchphrase.
Finally, I refuse to recognise its legitimacy becase I'd been downloading non-XML webcasts for at least three years before the first iPod was announced. I fail to see how webcast + XML = podcast, especially when it took a while to be supported by anything Apple.
"rootkit"? Who cares? It's a wondrous technical term that means, well, it means something. I might even care if I needed to know.
What I did (and sorta still) need to know is what a "foreign SMTP server" is. It shows up in fuck-knows how many reject slips from you-name-it email servers. Like a complete idiot I googled the term (complete with "meaning" and/or "definition" or whatever) and never did find out what the son of a bitch means.
OK, I pretty much know that "foreign" means "not domestic", and that "domestic" refers to "here" (read: "local, under my immediate control"); but, my point is that I wanted to know what it means and I still have no idea. So much for having a common term show up in a glossary or a lexicon that is searchable (or findable) by the ubiquitous Google.
Hey, I now know what a "rootkit" is: kit=undersized fur-bearing animal + root=underground portion of a plant. (AHD3) I'm not really certain what all this has to do with computers but I see the term tossed about all the time these days, so I'm sure it belongs in the dictionary.