Posts matching tags 'newspeak'
2007/5/11
A US broadcasting executive has called for the industry to ditch digital rights management (DRM), because of the bad reputation it has with consumers. From now on, instead of DRM, the industry should use Digital Consumer Enablement (DCE), which does much the same thing, only sounds nicer. You see, instead of restricting what you, the potentially thieving consumer, can do, it enables you to enjoy the content in ways that your benevolent corporate elder siblings want you to:
Digital Consumer Enablement, would more accurately describe technology that allows consumers "to use content in ways they haven't before," such as enjoying TV shows and movies on portable video players like iPods. "I don't want to use the term DRM any longer," said Zitter, who added that content-protection technology could enable various new applications for cable operators.Though as someone pointed out in the comments, every time Hollywood come up with a freshly sanitised name, someone will come up with a more honest acronym for it, like, for example, Digital Captivity Enforcement.
(via /.) ¶ [no comments]
2006/11/17
The U.S. government has eliminated hunger in America. Thanks to a recent change in terminology, 35 million formerly hungry Americans now merely have "very low food security".
(via 
bengraham) ¶ [no comments]
2004/11/17
The latest Orwellian threat to democratic discourse is verbless language, à la Teflon Tony Blair:
Humphrys notes Blair's apparent fear of verbs and mocks his speeches, which are peppered with verbless phrases like "new challenges, new ideas," or "for our young people, a brighter future" and "the age of achievement, at home and abroad".
By using this technique, Humphrys says, Blair is simply evading responsibility.
"The point about verbs is that they commit the speaker," he writes. "Verbs cement sentences to their meaning so it's not surprising that politicians tend to mistrust them."
(via bOING bOING)