[Ads-l] Oxymoron seen: "official bootleg"

[Dave Wilton]

"Official bootleg" is rather common in the music business, referring to an authorized recording of a live performance.

It goes back to at least 1991 and "Paul McCartney Unplugged: The Official Bootleg," a recording of McCartney's MTV performance.

The oxymoron is probably the result of a semantic shift from bootleg meaning "unofficial recording, often of a live performance" to "recording of a live performance."

I have no clue what an official bootleg of a comic book is. 



-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Wilson Gray
Sent: Sunday, July 03, 2016 2:03 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: [ADS-L] Oxymoron seen: "official bootleg"

http://www.viz.com/bleach

--
-Wilson
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All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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