Web 2.0 declared as millionth word
By Sam ChimesUS firm Global Language Monitor (GLM) do as you’d expect from the name, monitor language globally, and they’ve declared the millionth English word to be Web 2.0.
The term however is, as Mashable’s Adam Ostrow points out, slipping from use despite this ‘official recognition’ – “the term Web 2.0 was certainly significant – and remains so to some extent – to the recent history of the Web. However, the things that constituted “Web 2.0” two years ago – social networking, web-based software, and content sharing – have become so commonplace, that it’s rare we refer specifically to them in that context any more.”
Regardless of GLM’s criteria for recognising words, there is debate around the legitimacy of Web 2.0 in its place of millionth English word mostly due to the fluid evolution of language. The BBC has got lexicographers involved who are quoted en masse, “the exact size of the English vocabulary is impossible to quantify, but if every technical term or obscure specialist word is accepted then we are already beyond one million.”
It’s all interesting stuff, but one thing for sure is the term Web 2.0 being considered shows the prominence of the services it encompasses. And the fact that we’re already talking about the phrase as out-dated as it knocks on the door of officialdom demonstrates how fast the online space moves.
