Neologisms and Buzz Words of Online Copywriting

Sometimes the World Wide Web is referred to as the Wild Wild Web as it can seem to be an environment where anything goes. The ever expanding numbers of social media participants play fast and loose with grammar.

With new services and products being developed daily, it can feel like the list of new words, and new ways to use words, is building faster than you can keep up with it. Dictionaries and reference guides celebrate this regularly with a “word of the year”, usually one that has been in heavy use by the Internet audience for the three years preceding its entrance into a dictionary.

For example, in 2005, “podcast” was voted word of the year by the editors of the New Oxford American dictionary, while “blog” had its day in 2004 when it was declared word of the year by Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary. The word “blog” was coined in 1999.

Online services can quickly become verbs in everyday language, so we talk of “Googling something” instead of “searching on Google” and of “Facebooking someone”. Always remember that you are writing for your users first and foremost. If your content is aimed at cutting-edge early-adopters, then litter it with the latest buzz words. If your audience does not know the difference between Firefox and Internet Explorer, then be cautious when using a word that did not exist the day before.Users dictate your copy.