Simon Morris's Blog

July 2008 Archives

When Buzzwords Go Bad

I always assumed the word "jargon" was a reasonably recent addition to the English languages, but a quick glance at the OED gives examples of its use dating back as far as Chaucer. It would seem that man has been uttering "... unintelligible or meaningless talk or writing; nonsense, gibberish" for centuries! Or perhaps that should be "...conversing by means of symbols otherwise meaningless; a cipher, or other system of characters or signs having an arbitrary meaning" ?

Gibberish, or just a cipher? The dual meaning perhaps reflects the inclusive/exclusive nature of jargon — if you're part of the 'in group' jargon is useful shorthand, but to outsiders that same jargon is unintelligible and meaningless.

If "jargon" is centuries old, I wonder how old is the practice of using it to confuse and bedazzle? The OED's earliest source for "management speak" ("[...]being obfuscatory, needlessly complex, or empty of useful meaning.") only dates back to a 1986 Sunday Times article, yet I suspect the practice is far far older.

The problem is no sooner has a new term entered the lexicon than someone, somewhere, will start to abuse it for whatever reason. The unfortunate popularisation of term "web" in place of "internet" was likely due to the ignorance of many politicians, journalists and other commentators during the early years of the fledling technology. However, years later the wholesale abuse of the (far too sexy for its own good) phrase "Web 2.0" was more down to 'marketing' than anything else.

This is precisely what has happened to "RIA", Rich Internet Application, a piece of jargon now so diluted through multiple interpretation that it doesn't really mean anything any more — at least, so say the members of the Java Posse in their 24th July podcast.

Is RIA meaningless? And if so, is it worth replacing it with a new term?

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