Author: mark

LONG TAIL: “The long tail is the large number of occurrences far from the “head” or central part of a distribution of popularities, probabilities or such. In statistics, a probability distribution is said to have a long tail if a larger share of population rests within its tail than would under a normal distribution.” – from the Wikipedia entry for long tail.

I know a man who drives a tow truck. He is a happy man. He makes a decent living and takes pride in his family. But that’s not why he’s happy. He’s happy because he is secure. When he encounters a long or obscure word, he shakes his head and says in a folksy way, “I have no idea what you’re saying.” He will probably live until he’s 100, blissfully enjoying his beer on the porch whilst looking up at the stars.

I know many people who are not like this man. They are very insecure, and when they encounter an impressive word, their first reaction is typically the same as Mr. Tow Truck Driver: “I have no idea what he’s saying!” This is followed by much hand-wringing and fretting they will be found wanting. Of course, the definition of said word will be Googled, and these insecures will then utter, email or memorialize this word as much as possible. By doing this, they: 1. prove they are smart; 2. embarrass others who don’t know what this obscure or misused jargon means. And so the cycle repeats.

And that is how long tail entered the common lexicon. The phrase hadn’t existed long before Chris Anderson wrote his groundbreaking article in Wired magazine explaining how Amazon had changed commerce by enabling retailers to sell less popular items to smaller, niche markets. On a statistical distribution graph, these markets are in the skinny “tail” of the curve, falling off to the left:

Long tail theory became everyone’s favorite buzzword because – I don’t know, it was in Wired or it was the hot thing. Most likely because marketers and retailers figured they had just overheard some secret formula to success (forgetting that Wired has a circulation of more than 800,000 slackjawed lemmings just like them). So everyone jumped on long tail retailing – except everyone didn’t. Yeah, see, it sounds cool and hip, but in the end, big business wants big business. They don’t want to sell a few Tuvan throat singing MP3s when they can sell a gazillion Miley Cyrus CDs. Still, long tail sounds cool, so it’s off to the races. Now we have long tail marketing, long tail SEO, long tail video production, long tail bread bakeries… I’m kidding on that last one (for now).

And we also have headlines like these:

The Long Tail of a Hurricane

The Long Tail of the LIBOR Scandal

Neither of these news stories have anything to do with long tail theory or statistics. Nope. They’re just about the long-lasting fallout of hurricanes and financial malfeasance. Would they have used the words long tail were it not for the Chris Anderson article and the fawning lip-service it spawned? Does a bear short in the exchange?

Now, I close this lengthy article with my typical entreaty to write smarter. But I know most of you reading this are too insecure to not use a juicy, trendy phrase like long tail if you can get away with it. (“We need to facilitate a postmortem on our long tail strategy to stakeholders!”) Fine, don’t listen to me. But the next time you need a tow, just remember the guy hauling your Beemer out of the ditch is a happier person than you.

– Otto E. Mezzo

References: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.10/tail.html
http://www.npr.org/blogs/pictureshow/2012/11/29/166165560/the-long-tail-of-a-hurricane
http://theconversation.edu.au/the-long-tail-of-the-libor-scandal-rbs-settlement-opens-the-gate-to-civil-penalties-12089

MISNOMER: “1. the misnaming of a person in a legal instrument; 2. a. a use of a wrong or inappropriate name; b. a wrong name or inappropriate designation.” – Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition

Misnomer means, quite literally, “wrong name” (mis + nominare, the same Latin root for nominate, nomenclature and, oh, name). When something is a misnomer, it is misnamed. The ladybug is a misnomer because it is not a true bug. Same with the jellyfish and starfish, as neither are fishes. Pencil lead contains no lead (misnomer), and so it goes. What a misnomer is not is a misleading or false statement, regardless of the origin:

Pending bills aimed at decriminalizing libel are “incomplete” and also a “misnomer,” said Justice Secretary Leila De Lima. (Philippine Daily Inquirer) No, these bills may be a “joke,” but unless they are not actually bills, chances are they are not misnomers.

Terrorism is a tactic used by individuals with specific ideologies. Killing an ideology is nearly impossible. The war on terror is a complete misnomer. (Frontpagemag.com) This writer wants to convey the War on Terror is ineffective, a poorly conceived idea – not that it’s misnamed. Again, “joke” may be more what the author intended – or perhaps “lie.”

Aztecs coach Rocky Long says rush defense rankings are a misnomer, especially in the Mountain West. (North County Times) Blaaagh! They are not a misnomer. They don’t tell the whole story, or they mislead or create misconceptions, but “rush defense rankings” rate teams according to their rush defense. Sounds about right.

So why use misnomer to mean deception or misconception? Because it sounds learned. And because it’s a noun, and using nouns shields a writer from using verbs which assign accountability to an action. Observe what happens with a little editing:

Pending bills aimed at decriminalizing libel are “incomplete” and “so poorly written as to be impotent.”

The architects of the war on terror are willfully deceiving the nation.

A little too much punch for us, huh? Well, I won’t belabor the point. If your “global company” only does business in two countries, that’s a misnomer. If your global company doesn’t know its Australian office from its Austrian office, that’s no misnomer. Your company just sucks.

Okay, since I’ve been accused of always being a negative Nancy, here is the first correct example of misnomer that came up under a Google News search:

Almost any woman who has been pregnant can tell you the moniker “morning sickness,” is a bit of a misnomer since the nausea can strike at any time. (Washington Times)

Perfect example. Keep calm and carry on.

– Otto E. Mezzo

References: “Bills ‘decriminalizing’ libel a misnomer, says DOJ chief,” Philippine Daily Inquirer, November 7, 2012

“Why terrorist attacks have quadrupled since 2001,” Frontpagemag.com, December 5, 2012

“Aztecs hope to avoid potential trap game against Wyoming,” North County Times, November 23, 2012

“Severe morning sickness: A problem for more than just Kate Middleton,” The Washington Times, December 3, 2012

¹⁶ Then two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him. ¹⁷ The one woman said, “Oh, my lord, this woman and I live in the same house, and I gave birth to a child while she was in the house. ¹⁸ Then on the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. And we were alone. There was no one else with us in the house; only we two were in the house. ¹⁹ And this woman’s son died in the night, because she lay on him. ²⁰ And she arose at midnight and took my son from beside me, while your servant slept, and laid him at her breast, and laid her dead son at my breast. ²¹ When I rose in the morning to nurse my child, behold, he was dead. But when I looked at him closely in the morning, behold, he was not the child that I had borne.” ²² But the other woman said, “No, the living child is mine, and the dead child is yours.” The first said, “No, the dead child is yours, and the living child is mine.” Thus they spoke before the king.

²³ Then the king said, “The one says, ‘This is my son that is alive, and your son is dead’; and the other says, ‘No; but your son is dead, and my son is the living one.’” ²⁴ And the king said, “Bring me a sword.” So a sword was brought before the king. ²⁵ And the king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other.” ²⁶ Then the woman whose son was alive said to the king, because her heart yearned for her son, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death.” But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.” ²⁷ Then the king answered and said, “Give the living child to the first woman, and by no means put him to death; she is his mother.” ²⁸ And all Israel heard of the judgment that the king had rendered, and they stood in awe of the king, because they perceived that the wisdom of God was in him to do justice.

– I Kings 3:16-28 (English Standard Version)

“Great Solomon’s ghost! Did you have to include the whole dadblained passage? Couldn’t you have just split the baby and post half of it?”

No. And you just demonstrated why.

Splitting the baby, an attention-getting turn of phrase for sure, has its origins in this Biblical narrative. Directly preceding this passage is one in which God asks the young King Solomon, who has just taken the throne amidst a power struggle, to ask him for anything he wants. Instead of riches of fame, Solomon asks for wisdom to rule wisely. God is very happy at this choice. He grants Solomon this wisdom – just in time for this difficult she said-she said case. In the days before genetic testing, Solomon demonstrated both a clever mind and a keen understanding of human nature by “splitting the baby.”

Today, most people display neither cleverness nor understanding, especially when they use this term. Observe this gem from the New York Times:

Mr. Jobs rarely split the baby. And while there is no doubt that we’re moving toward a world devoid of spinning hard disks and optical drives, Apple clearly wants to give its customers the option to buy the older tech.

It is splitting the baby.

Or this one from Forbes, an article titled “Good Negotiators Don’t Split Babies”:

Splitting the baby is a common but ineffective strategy for resolving a dispute or negotiating a good business deal.

Successful negotiators don’t settle for splitting the difference between two unacceptable proposals.

Yes, those are the two opening paragraphs, and you will notice they reveal what this author (and so many other) thinks splitting the baby means: splitting the difference.

NO. If you mean “splitting the difference,” use the phrase splitting the difference, not splitting the baby. You “split the baby” if you propose an ingenious and drastic solution to an intractable problem, especially one that results in neither party getting what they want. Of course, it is instructive that Solomon knew he wouldn’t have to split the baby. The threat itself was enough to solve the problem.

Since ingenuity and creative thinking are discouraged in the business world, you will probably never find occasion to use splitting the baby in its correct form. Which is for the better. I’d hate to see what most managers do when handed a newborn and a sharp object.

– Otto E. Mezzo

See also Gordian knot, another unsolvable problem requiring an unorthodox solution. And also washing one’s hands (of a problem), another Biblical reference.

References:
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/11/is-apple-splitting-the-baby/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/shenegotiates/2012/11/05/good-negotiators-dont-split-babies/

Sighting: House Democrats brace for some defections among moderates on impeachment of Trump

http://lexicide.com/seen-in-wapo-splitting-the-baby/

MEMORIALIZE: “1. to address or petition by a memorial; 2. commemorate: …an exciting period in history that has been memorialized in many popular books and movie; …at the entrance to the park stands a statue memorializing the novelist Sir Walter Scott.”

Is everyone straight on what a memorial is? It celebrates someone who’s dead. Dead dead dead. Memorial Day is for our war dead. A memorial hospital honors a philanthropist who is dead. If you’re in the memorial business, you know what you make? Tombstones. Not carpeting or cookware or lawn care implements. Tombstones. For dead people.

So when you read this sentence:

Such communications may be memorialized in emails, memoranda, or notes.

perhaps a tear comes to your eye. You think of the sage advice your grandmother offered, or perhaps a wedding homily from your favorite uncle, now deceased and sorely missed… except that this line comes from an official Department of Justice memo, and the “communications” involved are “‘[s]ubstantive’ case-related communications” that “may contain discoverable information.” Hmm. Hardly worthy of a memorial, but certainly bearing the need to be preserved or recorded.

Or how about this one:
This serves to memorialize and inform you and the other members of the Detroit Board of Education…

“Oh,” the Board members (and recipients of this memo) are thinking. “We’ve passed into the great beyond. Crap. I really wanted to plant those forsythia borders this weekend.” But wait – read on:

…of those certain events that took place during my weekly meeting with the Board President Mathis.

“I see,” the Board sighs with relief. “The Superintendent doesn’t understand that memorialize means something other than ‘record.’ At least I can plant those shrubberies.” (Read the whole memo here, but be warned, the content is – um, disturbing and sexually explicit. I wish they hadn’t memorialized it.)

But what bugs me more than this overblown alternative to “remember” or “commit to the record” is that memorialize, as I mentioned before, is for dead people. Not memos. Not sheaves of foolscap. And it’s only a matter of time before HR managers memorialize employee birthdays.

So unless you are dealing with the deceased, you have no business memorializing jack doodle. Unless Jack Doodle has recently passed on. In which case, a postmortem is also in order.

instead, use: record, remember, preserve, commit to the record, write down

Otto E. Mezzo

References: http://www.justice.gov/dag/discovery-guidance.html

http://download.gannett.edgesuite.net/detnews/2010/pdf/0618mathis.pdf

Suggested by Nancy Friedman’s article “Weird Words from the Corporate Lexicon” at Visual Thesaurus.

AGNOSTIC: “a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God.” – Oxford English Dictionary

Derived from the Greek a (without) + gnosis (knowledge), agnosticism preaches that we don’t and can’t know the nature and existence of the Divine. As Bertrand Russell put it:

“An agnostic thinks it impossible to know the truth in matters such as God and the future life with which Christianity and other religions are concerned. Or, if not impossible, at least impossible at the present time.”

Thomas Huxley, speaking before the age of plausible deniability, summed it up even more succinctly: “I neither affirm nor deny the immortality of man.”

Of course, Huxley is just some old dude who died before 2010 and didn’t even have a Twitter account, so what does he know? In our modern, enlightened age, agnostic simply means “impartial.” Exempli gratia:

The JPMorgan service will draw unneeded money and securities from however many clearing brokers an investor uses, Portney said. “It’s clearing broker agnostic,” she said. (“JPMorgan Bank to Hold Collateral After Futures Firms’ Losses,” Bloomberg Businessweek, August 14, 2012)

Spare Backup, Inc. (“Spare Backup”), a provider of data backup and security software for smartphones, tablets and PCs, which is carrier and manufacturer agnostic, announced today that it has successfully completed an agreement… (“Spare Backup Reaches Agreement on Principle Business Terms for Major International Telco Launch in 2012,” RedOrbit.com, August 9, 2012)

Aetna ‘Agnostic’ on Acquisition Size, CFO Zubretsky Says (headline, Bloomberg Businessweek, July 31, 2012)

What’s most interesting about this shift is that it seems so logical, but actually reflects the tortured, imprecise associations that have given rise to other lexicides. Just because one is agnostic (as a religion), it doesn’t mean one is impartial or accepting of any religion. Agnostics profess only a lack of knowledge in supernatural matters. True agnostics have arrived here through a process of thought, not through apathy or the desire to sleep in on Sunday, and do not profess neutrality in matters of faith. The Freedom From Religion Foundation claims to be “the nation’s largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and skeptics),” and no one would call them impartial. (Read their website and see if you can disagree.) So where did this idea that agnostics are the disinterested stakeholders come from?

Who knows? Maybe the Apple-PC “religious” wars. Or maybe I’m wrong, and companies who claim to be platform-agnostic really don’t (and can’t) know which system is Diabolic and which one Divine. Seriously, though – in a knowledge-based economy, why would anyone hire a know-nothing company? I’d be looking for the ones who preach predestination. They’re the ones you want on your side.

– Otto E. Mezzo

References: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-08-14/jpmorgan-to-house-client-collateral-in-bank-after-futures-losses

http://www.redorbit.com/news/entertainment/1112672736/spare_backup_reaches_agreement_on_principle_business_terms_for_major/

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-07-31/aetna-still-has-appetite-for-big-acquisition-cfo-zubretsky-says