NetGen, nominal, and other jargon

[Dave Wilton]

> This article uses a term I am not familiar with, "NetGen",
> <begin quote>...for young people, the Internet is like
> oxygen, and the 13-24
> set "are on instant messenger before theier morning coffee."
> To serve that
> crowd---the "NetGen"...<end quote> (page 56 column 1 2nd
> paragraph, the term
> is used several other times in the article).

It doesn't seem to be a very common term. Goojaing turns up less than 100
relevant citations ("netgen" is a command in at least one computer language
and is also used as name of several ISP domains, generating thousands of
unrelated usages). The earliest relevant hit appears to be from 21 Nov 1996,
"GenX v. NetGen", in alt.society.generation-x.

Microsoft's use may be an independent coinage. "Nextgen" is a common
software term referring to the next generation of software and the
Microsofties may have made a play on this.

> The article also uses several other jargon terms that I suspect are
> unfamiliar to the general public and to the majority of
> Internet users:
>    broadband (p 56 col 1)

"Broadband" seems to be pretty universal. I agree the others should be
defined in a general-purpose article.

> The article on pp 58f uses the term "telco" ("telephone
> company") (p 58 col 1 para 2)

"Telco" is pretty common business jargon.