Archive for July 10th, 2006

In Brightest Day?

Posted July 10, 2006 By Dave Thomer

I don’t have much to add to this post, but Matt Yglesias’ use of Green Lantern to illustrate certain conservative visions of foreign policy deserves a read.

The emphasis on willpower is especially dangerous, I think, because it’s one of the things that leads to any criticism of the government or the military policy being seen as something that makes the country, the military, and the men and women actually doing the fighting all weaker.

Filed in Public Policy

Great Google-y Moogly

Posted July 10, 2006 By Dave Thomer

The Los Angeles Times reports that the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary has added “to google” as a verb in its latest edition, joining the Oxford English Dictionary’s online edition as recognizing that the name of the search engine has become a word in its own right. The article says that the first use of the verb was in a newspaper article five years ago, which is pretty young for a new word to be making it into the dictionary.

Unsurprisingly, the article also explores the dilemma that occurs when a brand name becomes so ubiquitous that it becomes an ordinary word: the company can lose trademark protection. The Merriam-Webster mentions that the term is derived from a trademark, and defines the word to specifically refer to used of the Google engine as opposed to a generic search. Given that Yahoo turned its own engine brand into a verb with the “Do You Yahoo!?” campaign, I think it’s hard to argue with the dictionary folks on this one.

Filed in Life in Practice