More Global Language Monitor silliness

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:35 PM -0500 1/29/06, Wilson Gray wrote:
>No, Ben. You're missing the point, which is the fact that Mr. Payack
>has a degree from Harvard. ;-)
>

and, as they say, Payack's a itch.

L

>On 1/29/06, Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>-----------------------
>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster:       Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
>>  Subject:      More Global Language Monitor silliness
>>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>  As if their inane annual word lists weren't bad enough, now the Global
>>  Language Monitor has hoodwinked a New York Times reporter into buying
>>  a whole truckload of nonsense...
>>
>>  -----
>>  http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/29/realestate/29cov.html
>>
>>  The yearning for a smooth transition from the surging [real estate]
>>  market is seen in the increasingly frequent use in the last six months
>>  of the phrase "soft landing."
>>
>>  "Soft landing is everyone's big hope," said Paul JJ Payack, president
>>  of the Global Language Monitor (languagemonitor.com), which analyzes
>>  language trends and their impact on politics, culture and business.
>>
>>  Mr. Payack, who graduated from Harvard with a bachelor's degree in
>>  comparative literature, calculated the popularity of some 36 buzzwords
>>  chosen by a reporter. He used his Predictive Quantities Indicator, or
>>  P.Q.I., an algorithm that tracks words and phrases in the media and on
>>  the Internet in relation to frequency, contextual usage and appearance
>>  in global media. It is a weighted index that takes into account
>>  year-to-year increases and acceleration in the last several months.
>>
>>  Among the market buzzwords he ranked, "soft landing" and "pause" had
>>  the highest P.Q.I.'s. They were ranked first and second respectively,
>>  while the more ominous sounding "housing bubble" ranked seventh. "
>>  'Pause' is another one of these hopeful things," Mr. Payack said.
>>
>>  (Mr. Payack can also verify that "O.K." is the most frequently spoken
>>  word, that "outside the mainstream" was the top phrase of 2005 and
>>  that as of Jan. 26 at 10:59 a.m. Eastern time, the number of words in
>>  the English language was 986,120.)
>>  -----
>>
>>  It's all scientific, you see! He has an algorithm!
>>
>>
>>  --Ben Zimmer
>>
>>  ------------------------------------------------------------
>>  The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
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>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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