Democtionary
Friday, March 23, 2007 by Erin
Demos ,"the think tank for everyday democracy" (at least, that's what they call themselves on their website) has "called for the Oxford English Dictionary to be replaced as the leading authority on English by a website listing new words suggested by the public in the UK and overseas." (according to a story in The Independent)
They want this site to be called democtionary.org and have put up a call for help at that URL.
I'm absolutely, positively, 100% FOR the idea of having web-based, user-generated new word collecting, but the idea that one-dictionary-fits-all gives me a headache. The OED is not a list of the birth announcements of shiny new words, it's more like a genealogical document that traces the family tree of each word included. How that would be replaced efficiently by a new-words-only website I leave as an exercise for the reader.
They want this site to be called democtionary.org and have put up a call for help at that URL.
I'm absolutely, positively, 100% FOR the idea of having web-based, user-generated new word collecting, but the idea that one-dictionary-fits-all gives me a headache. The OED is not a list of the birth announcements of shiny new words, it's more like a genealogical document that traces the family tree of each word included. How that would be replaced efficiently by a new-words-only website I leave as an exercise for the reader.
Labels: historical_dictionaries, wikis
| »
