El Reg issues Satan word alert

El Reg's lexicographical soviet this morning ramped up to Defcon Red after our Mephistophelean terminology radar detected a potentially-fatal neologism hidden in an otherwise innocent Reuters report. The piece in question concerns something about TV smash Lost spin-offs. Hardly earth-shattering stuff, but try this quote from …

[Brutus]

While you're at it...

berate said producer about his lack of grammatical/lexical knowledge with respect to 'medias'. Media, like data, is a plural.

c.f. FOTW ;-)

[Anonymous Coward]

And another thing

Not only that, the man goes on about "separate medias". As any fule kno, media is the plural of medium. He should have said something like "unique mediastream playpaths" or "brand-enhancing thoughtways" or something with -gasm at the end.

[Dax Farrer]

Mobe

We demand a recount !

[Anonymous Coward]

Mobisode

Well, wouldn't that be an episode of the mobile phone version of a series?

T

[Anonymous Coward]

also while your there

Tell him to ask the writers to think about what they are writing.

The narrative of Lost is just that... lost, cos thay haven't got a clue what they plan to write next... really for all the glitz Lost is just a random journey through any-idea-the-writers-have-today.

[Anonymous Coward]

Comprehensibility...

... is not the same as acceptibility. Just because we know what they mean doesn't stop them sounding like twats.

[James]

Tardisode

Wow, mobisode is right up there with Doctor Who's tardisodes. Until my wife explained the term to me I assumed it was episodes written by that deus ex obsessed 'tard Russell T Davies instead of the better writers like Steven Moffat... >_<

[Steve Sutton]

Mobisodes?

You're all fools! This is clearly another case of a hapless Reg hack not using apostophes in the right place, along with some incorrect spelling, capitalisation and a missing space!

They have quite obviously signed and exclusive deal with shining musical talent Moby, to use his odes!

[Mike Taylor]

But what does it mean?

According to wikipedia it's trademarked too.

[Anonymous Coward]

Genius at work

Trademarked you say ?!? You have to marvel at the amazing intellects on display here.

"I see what you've done there Dan ... you've melded the words 'mobile' and 'episode' - and made a whole new word ... that's just astonimazing"

"You know ... we really ought to trademark it before someone steals OUR NEW WORD"

What a bunch of tibbets.

[Anonymous Coward]

And...

When your boys have sorted mobisodes, can they take whoever came up with "webinar" for a little drive?

[Bill Fresher]

Re: While you're at it...

Media is a plural of medium - in the 1920s when "media" began to be used for the singular, "medias" was the accepted plural. Although not commonly used, "medias" ain't wrong.

[DaveT]

Re: And...

***When your boys have sorted mobisodes, can they take whoever came up with "webinar" for a little drive?***

Indeed. And I'll raise you the use of "Dub-dub-dub" for "www", a term so preposterously simple-minded that it causes automatic thoughts of violence in me whenever I hear someone use it.

[Sabahattin Gucukoglu]

WWW = Dub Dub Dub

<quote>

Indeed. And I'll raise you the use of "Dub-dub-dub" for "www", a term so preposterously

simple-minded that it causes automatic thoughts of violence in me whenever I hear

someone use it.

</quote>

Ah, so it *was* a "Trendy" term being borrowed and not some stupid term Humanware made up. Humanware, you see, made my blindness-specific paperweight - sorry, PDA. (This is essentially a box with keyboard and braille display built into it and a few of the usual storage and ports suited to a mobile device, running a menu-based structure of programs in a blindy custom-made proprietary shell on top of Windows CE, but with much less charm, many more bugs and far less opportunities to extend or run other mainstream programs on. Every app is custom-written, and apart from its extreme ease of use and excellent text-to-speech synthesiser and braille display I otherwise lothe it. Love-hate relationship. http://www.humanware.com/ ) The abomination that is dub-dub-dub is hardcoded into the text-to-speech synthesiser. To be fair, dub-dub-dub is shorter than double-u-double-u-double-u and I have more than once immitated it in other TTS dictionaries for the sake of brevity, although I agree the phrase is otherwise hideously bedlamic. But since the device (mostly due to its braille display, which is what I mostly use it for connected to my Linux box in dumb terminal mode with brltty) is just over five grand (quid, of course, not dollars or anything like that), I wonder what kind of fate you'd have in store for the thing?

Cheers,

Sabahattin

[Tom Haczewski]

Tibbets?

I don't know that word. But it doesn't seem to be trademarked...

Shotgun!

[the Jim bloke]

Mobicide

While the creator and any users of the term 'mobisode' are well and truy due for some quality time with a roll of chicken wire and a cheese grater, the similar sounding word 'mobicide' deserves more common recognition.

It can refer to

a) the destruction of a mobile phone, either by gripping it by one end and swinging it as hard as possible at a fixed object, or for newer models whose weight and size make that less gratifying, grinding under foot or a vehicle, or dropping it into some ridiculously overpriced trendy drink.

b) the murder of a mobile phone user by inserting their annoying piece of trash someplace it will interfere terminally with their continuing function.

it does not refer to using mobile phones to remotely detonate explosive devices, thats just so lower class.

[John Browne]

Re: Dub Dub Dub

If I have to verbalise www, I just say Dubyas. Kind of appropriate.

[Graham Dawson]

And here's me thinking it was something else entirely...

Surely a mobisode is when you throw expensive gadgets at your poor down-trodden house servants? I hear Naomi Campbell suffered several mobisodes in the last year or so...

[Nano nano]

REarrange

Judging by the ferocity of response I would just swap the suffixes [-ces] and refer to it as an epibile.

[Aubry Thonon]

Dub-dub-dub?

'round here we use "wub-wub-wub". ^_^

[Cortland Richmond]

Dub dub dub

Doesn't that belong to Hugh Lofting?

Cortland

"Doolitttle -- or do nothing!"

[Trevor]

Dub, dub, dud and www

When refering to the www I often think that triple double U ought to be sextubleU. Can I now apply for my patent:-) ????

[Anonymous Coward]

@ Trevor

I used "sextuple-u" once. Got a strange look, and then "ah" as it clicked in the boss' head.

[Iain Porter]

WWW...

'wer wer wer', If i'm feeling lazy. Never known anyone use 'dub dub dub'... thank god.

Other lazy pronunciations... missing dots out of web addresses ("wer wer wer google co uk") and parts of IP addresses ("192 168 1.1" - the last one must subconsciously be more important to me) and assuming people know where they ought to go. Some do... parents have a distressing habit of typing what I tell them verbatim.