Rant- It's nothing but gobbledegook to this journalist

     English. Some call it the language of commerce. Most folks in this country speak it. But I sometimes wonder if people in the internet world learned it from a different textbook than I did. In what I’m sure will prove a vain effort to stop this language e-volution, I've compiled a top-10 list of words and phrases most overused and misused by the dot-coms that send me press releases:

10. Monetize: E-commerce startups seem to think it means “grab as much cash as you can before your investors figure out that your revolutionary e-commerce solution has about as much practical application as a Clapper-activated electric toothbrush.” The dictionary definition is “to coin money.” So, to avoid counterfeiting investigations, don’t use this word.

9. Deliverables: Are we talking babies here? Or do people find their products too embarrassing to mention by name?

8. Paradigms: What is this? A paradigm(s) still wouldn’t buy a cup of coffee or catch my attention in a press release.

7. B2C: Is this an acronym or the latest cheesy boy band?

6. Revolutionary: Even if half of today’s wannabe dot-com revolutions 
were successful, so many fiefdoms would exist in Austin alone that no 
one could  attend UT  without paying out-of-state tuition.

5. E-everything: Is e-anything as e-annoying as the e-ubiquitous e?

4. Challenge: “Problem” is such a negative word, isn’t it?

3. Solutions: What flacks say when they don’t know what else to say. Most 
often used in attempts to trick journalists into thinking that press releases
hawking products or services are more than shameless commercial  plugs.

2. Turn-key solutions: I’m not really sure about this one, but I think what 
it really  means is “the product/paid service was someone else’s idea.”

1. Leverage: Speaking as a purist, what the heck do marketers know 
about physics?

     Please post this list in your office or cubicle, and anytime you feel the urge to use one of these words, envision your high-school English teacher rolling over in her grave.

  Sherri Deatherage Green is a freelance journalist

  (c) Copyright Haymarket Business Publications Limited 2000. No part of this data may be reproduced without prior written permission of the copyright owner.

  Revolution USA, October 2000

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