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The Weekly Round-Up: 12.12.08
Don't know what a TLA is? You're so 404…

By silicon.com

Published: Friday 12 December 2008

Technology has had a profound effect on how we live, shop, interact socially or do business.

It's also seeping into the fabric of our language like the odour of a three-week old egg sandwich that's been left behind a rack in the server room.

That's the view of some research by Post Office Telecoms that claims "as the English language shifts into cyber-language, TLAs are cropping up all over the place".

You probably already knew that TLA stood for 'three letter acronym'. If you didn't you may as well skip to the next bit.

Here are a few examples of recent neologisms that may make a determined and confident march on the offices of the Oxford English Dictionary in search of recognition come the New Year.

Code 18: refers to a problem that was the fault of the person using the computer in the first place and almost certainly not 'a virus or something'. Since the user sits approximately 18 inches from the screen, it became a 'code 18'.

Code 35: now means 'to be broke'. It's derived from the message flashed up by the ticket barriers on London Underground if your Oyster has run out of credit. It's a London thing.

Then there's 'book', meaning 'cool'. The explanation behind this one is that if you type 'cool' into a mobile phone with predictive text switched on (not this one though), the word that results is 'book' so book has come to mean cool.

The Round-Up tried it on an iPhone and got 'cool' but it got more success on the better half's Sony Ericsson although not in glorious, crisp Helvetica. Does this mean the iPhone is officially not book?

Formerly, Error 404 was the venerable and now rarely spotted web page error-message but now it stands for 'clueless'.

Another piece of slang that techies use for the same purpose is Picnic - 'problem in chair, not in computer'. Meanwhile a CGI Joe is a reference to the unfortunate reputation of those that do CGI script programming have for being dull - as dull as a plastic doll.

Notice these are largely all terms of abuse? What does that tell you about people who work in technology?

It's dizzying watching language grow and expand like evolution in fast forward. Except fast forward is a reference to tape-based media of the 1980s, which indicates just how out of touch the Round-Up really is.

So there we are: techies are changing both the world and the way we articulate it. It's a heady achievement. For better or for worse.

Book!

Christmas is hurtling towards us at a fair pace of knots - if you already can't remember what happened this year check out this photo story that should jog your memory.

You may be struggling for present ideas. Not to fear, for silicon.com's resident elf has come up with not one but three guides for top present ideas this year.

Two are guides for the techie who has everything but presumably just needs a little bit more to fulfil his or her materialistic urges. And one is for the CIO - just in case you really want to get into the boss' good books.

It's also the time of year for gathering around a festive board game. But what's this? According to a report in the Daily Mail a mother who bought a Scrabble game on the Nintendo DS for her eight-year-old son was surprised when the virtual opponent produced a few unusual words to win the game.

How unusual? Well consider this: 't*ts'.

The game also came up with 'f******'.

"As if that wasn't bad enough, it received a triple score and won the game for the character, whose name was Camilla," reported The Daily Mail.

(The Round-Up had to share that last sentence quoted in full because it quite literally fell off its chair laughing reading it.)

A spokesman for Ubisoft, which makes the game, told the Mail: "We are sorry the game has caused concern but it includes a "junior" option that stops it using unusual or offensive words."

The Round-Up would put it slightly more succinctly: RTFM.

Fancy an iPhone 3G for Christmas? Of course you do. Can't afford one? Of course you can't, especially as a gift.

Luckily Apple has had a bright idea to help the iPhone-have-nots this festive season - the iPhone 3G Gift Card. Basically a gift voucher for an iPhone.

You can choose the total amount of iPhone love you want to give by selecting a sum between $25 and $2,500.

According to the blurb on the US Apple website: "iPhone 3G is a lot of amazing things - a revolutionary phone, widescreen iPod, breakthrough internet device, and home for thousands of applications. And with an iPhone 3G Gift Card, it's also the perfect gift. Give one in any amount starting at $25 toward the cost of a new iPhone."

It's the "toward the cost" bit that's relevant.

Unlike a book voucher you can't just buy as much of an iPhone as your gift allows ("Just a bevelled edge and a mute button, thanks"), although you can buy other stuff in an Apple store with it.

Just find the other £143 and the £35 per month for 18 months and the revolutionary phone will be yours.

It's a bit like telling a loved one you bought them an Aston Martin, handing them a box with a couple of spark plugs and a windscreen wiper and telling them to drive safely...

"An iPhone? Oh darling, you shouldn't have!... Oh darling, you didn't..."

In other news this week:

The new crime wave: jobless techies. Be afraid, be very afraid.

By 'eck, it's grim up North.

Great Britain? Pah! We're all off to the Maldives.

And don't forget the caption competition…