I’ve been reading with interest about the keruffle involving Tech Crunch writer Alexia Tsotis and Summit Entertainment film studio about a comment published in that popular blog about a new Jake Gyllenhaall film called Source Code. Apparently Tsotis called the PR for the film a “buzzwordgasm”, as ccording to Summit their campaign was the first “cross-platform, trans-media campaign that transports audiences into the movie narrative using social media game play.”
What does the buzzwordgasm mean? Well, they are asking people to promote the film in their Facebook walls.I guess that any mention of a movie on Facebook qualifies as “cross-platform, trans-media” engagement. I guess that me talking about this in my blog would amount to “reverse clross-platform feedback loop”. Hey, I think I may have a talent for PR work!
Anyway, the story got me thinking at the apearance of other buzzwords that describe mundane things in order to make them sound more interesting. Here is a short list of some of my favourites:
- Crowd-sourcing: asking others to do your work for you.
- Immersive technology: 3D specs that have been around for decades. They looked silly then, they still look silly.
- Crowd-funding: asking for donations.
- Gamification: Trying to make your boring application/invention/idea a little bit more fun.
- Freecycling: Giving stuff away.
- Social tagging: Trying to determine what others are talking about.
- Vox-popping: Interviewing regular people.
- Social software: Anything that involves sharing between at least two people.
- Cloud computing: Errr… whenever asks you what is cloud computing, just adopt a contemptuous look, wave your hand around and say “it’s complicated, it’s out there, man!”
- Convergence: I can do other things on my phone other than talking on the phone!
- Downsizing: Let´s fire some people, but make it sound cool.
- Synergy: If the roadrunner was a word, it would be this (Hint: I always liked Wile E. Coyote).
- Rich media: Oh yes, we used to call this multimedia back in the Dark Ages.
- Holistic integration: Let’s hope our data will work with that database.
- Workflow: Getting stuff done.
Any suggestions?
6 Comments
Robert · March 17, 2011 at 8:59 am
I'll take this list to my next meeting and play a bingo with it.
I Better not make it a drinking game, i value my liver.
Amelia Andersdotter · March 17, 2011 at 9:28 am
What about something like the Right to be Forgotten as presented by Reding?
The best thing that I have ever heard about data in general is it's flighty, and it's sticky. Once you put it out there, it flies away. Once you put it out there, it sticks.
Privacy in general is quite buzzy. How horribly politically incorrect I am.
Andres · March 17, 2011 at 9:59 am
You do have to be quite buzzy, but you can get away with it I think.
Mick · March 17, 2011 at 12:57 pm
Digital Native: Somebody who uses a computer more than once a week
Andres · March 17, 2011 at 3:50 pm
Brilliant, how could I forget digital natives?
Grant S. Robertson · March 17, 2011 at 2:55 pm
Oh, you missed "Transliteracy," which has been soundly mocked by many in the Library and Information Science (LIS) circles. I have to admit that it has started to grow on me, but only because the word "literacy" has a pretty specific definition in the minds of most people and expanding that definition would be pretty hard to do. In the end, it is a buzzword in search of a definition.