Have you every wondered where some Internet terms derived?Since the Internet is a contribution of billions of users, I assumed the evolution of eSpeak derived from the masses.
Well, the good folks at Raidious developed an infographic that sheds light on this issue.
Here’s a synopsis…
The Evolution of eSpeak
Words that the Internet stole and made its own
- Follower – They’re all guided by what they follow and brands can only hope to create devotees.
- Friend – The meaning of “friends” evolved from a term of endearment to a simple online connection.
- Yelp – Before 2004, “yelp” only indicated a short sharp cry of pain. Now, “yelp” is a way of choosing where to eat tonight.
- Vine – Vines are not where wine grapes grow, they are where people show videos of themselves drinking wine.
The # symbol carries several different names with several different meanings
- Octothorpe – In the 1960s, Bell Labs needed a name for #symbols as part of touch-tone phone dialing. It adopted “octothorpe” for the eight points on the symbol with no clear reason for the “thorpe.” Or so the (unproven) theory goes.
- Pound Sign – To abbreviate weight by pound or the Latin “libra pondo”, lb. often became #. Number sign – In Britain, to not be confused with the currency pound, the #symbol widely denoted numbers, like the #2 pencil.
- Sharp Symbol – Musicians refer to the # as the sharp symbol, indicating a note is one-half step higher.
- Space – When proofreading, a copy editor indicates the need for a space with #.
- Hashtag – Inspired by 197-s’ IRC networks group and labeling system, Chris Messina proposed the use of the #symbol in a similar fashion for Twitter in August 2007. During the 2009-2010 Iranian elections, hastags started to grow into the phenomenon we know today. In June 2014, “hashtag” made its way into the Oxford English Dictionary.
The Selfie
Any way you slice it, the “self” is the subject and the object…therefore, a “selfie” must be an image of the person actually snapping the shot.
Infographic
