"Stay tuned" - the all-digital generation doesn't get this phrase (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Dave Wilton]

The hardware-software combination in your digital radio/tv/set-top box that
discriminates between the different digital signals is still called a
"tuner."

Like "dialing" a phone, the term that originally described a physical action
has transferred to the function served by that action. It's still used,
understood, and not going away any time soon.



-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of
Mullins, Bill AMRDEC
Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2012 12:25 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: "Stay tuned" - the all-digital generation doesn't get this
phrase (UNCLASSIFIED)

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

Seventy years ago, "staying tuned" was an active process.  By the sixties,
it was passive.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
Behalf Of
> Cohen, Gerald Leonard
> Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2012 11:19 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: "Stay tuned" - the all-digital generation doesn't get
this phrase
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
----------------------
> -
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at MST.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "Stay tuned" - the all-digital generation doesn't
get this
>               phrase
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------
> -
>
> That was my impression too.  I thought it was short for "Stay tuned to
> this station," i.e., "stay with this station."
>
> Gerald Cohen
>
>  ________________________________
>
>  Dan Goncharoff wrote, Mon 4/2/2012
>
> Although I am over 50 years old and listen to the radio all the time,
I had
> never thought of the phrase in this context before. (I guess I had
assumed
> it meant a positive version of "don't touch that dial".)
>
> DanG
>
>

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