original words, their creators and their subsequent users

[lesa.dill]

Has anyone else gone cross-eyed over they problems faced with new words
defined and explained by their originators and rapidly assimilated only to be
reanalyzed by the multiple users of the words?  One would be inclined to see
the reanalysis as folk etymology, but I wonder, since obviously (maybe as in
blog, and certainly other computer examples come to mind) the reanalysis is
popular, rapid, and often more transparent than the originator's definition.
Is using the originator's explanation prescriptivist? Or do we have to stick
by the historically rooted explanation?  All you lexicographers out there,
what do/would you do?
The cross-eyed (synchro/diachro) biolinguist,
Lesa Dill

>===== Original Message From American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
=====
>I've thought it was just blah log= [bla ahg].
>===== Original Message From Grant Barrett <gbarrett at monickels.com> =====
>>On jeudi 22 février 2001 23:41, Jane Parker <jpparker at ISERV.NET> wrote:
>>>This afternoon while listening to talk of the nation.  A bunch of
>>>technophilliacs were discussing the impact of techknoloby etc.
>>>Someone called in and was asking about the vast quantities of information
>>>availible blah blah and refered to it as blog.  I think is was a
contraction
>>>of backlog.  None of the panel members could define the word. and so it
>>>ended.  Anybody out there heard of blog?
>>
>>As someone who keeps two blogs himself, I will agree with Jane Parker's
>observation
>>that www.blogger.com is a good place to start and add a couple of things.
>>
>>The definition of blog is wide. One on end of the spectrum, it's a personal
>diary.
>>On the other, it's a list of "cool" links. In any case, most blogs have
these
>factors
>>in common:
>>
>>1. Run by an individual rather than a company.
>>2. Updates regularly, ideally daily in a kind of "log" format with dated
>entries.
>>3. Cool links provided.
>>
>>These days blogs are good generators and amplifiers of Internet memes, the
>latest
>>example I can think of being the "ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US" meme.
>>
>>The history of blogs is uncertain. Most people are willing to credit several
>"what's
>>new" pages that appeared pre-Yahoo (and even on Yahoo, back in the days when
>*all*
>>the new sites added to the net could be visited in an hour or so each day).
>Bjorn
>>Barger *did not* invent the blog.
>>
>>Some of the more popular blogs
>>
>>http://www.metafilter.com/    A group blog, run by an individual, but with
>links
>>posted by its members
>>http://slashdot.org/                 Blog or not? Most people agree that it
>is.
>>http://www.memepool.com/     Group blog, again. With an emphasis on odd or
>wacky
>>links
>>http://www.camworld.com/     One of the older blogs out there.
Tech-oriented.
>Lots
>>of links to other blogs.
>>
>>--
>>Grant Barrett
>>New York loves you back.
>>http://www.worldnewyork.org/