Jargon Watch: A Pocket Dictionary for the Jitterati (Hardwired) [Hardcover]

Gareth Branwyn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1997 | ISBN-10: 1888869062 | ISBN-13: 978-1888869064

Every era in America has its own language, every new culture its own lingo. JargonWatch documents the tortured and often hilarious new terminology that comes out of the high-pressure work environments of Silicon Valley, midtown Manhattan, and Hollywood, and captures the language of the new American culture while mocking its newness.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The "Jargon Watch" section of Wired magazine is where you'll find a small but dead-on window where cyberculture collides into language. This "pocket dictionary" is a collection of terms posted in that section since 1993, plus 100 new entries. Ever do any domain dipping (typing in random words between www. and .com just to find out what's out there)? Receive a zen mail (e-mail messages that arrive with no text in the message body)? Or maybe you've had an ohnosecond (that miniscule fraction of time in which you realize you've just made a BIG mistake). Gareth Branwyn's introduction is a short but cogent explanation of how jargon becomes popular in cyberculture.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Hardwired (May 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1888869062
• ISBN-13: 978-1888869064
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 3.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,107,186 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #46 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Nonfiction > Social Sciences > Sociology > Culture
  • #61 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauruses > Slang & Idioms

More About the Author

Gareth Branwyn (born January 21, 1958) is a writer, editor, and media critic.

He has covered technology, media, DIY and cyberculture for Wired, Esquire, the Baltimore Sun, Details, and numerous other publications. He has also been an editor at Mondo 2000 and Boing Boing (when it was a print zine), founded the personal tech site, StreetTech.com, and is the Editor-in-Chief of Make: Online and an editor at Make: Books.

Gareth co-edited The Happy Mutant Handbook and is the author of Jargon Watch: A Pocket Dictionary for the Jitterati, Jamming the Media, The Absolute Beginner's Guide to Building Robots, and Mosaic Quick Tour: Accessing and Navigating the World Wide Web (the first book written about the Web).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Read one a day!, September 11, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Jargon Watch: A Pocket Dictionary for the Jitterati (Hardwired) (Hardcover)

Fun book - read one a day to your coworkers. Sometimes very funny. The only thing I wish it had was the history of each word. Other somewhat related classics are "The Zen of Computer Programming" and "The Tao of Computer programming" though I don't know if they're still in print.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars fun, jaded, quick read, August 27, 1998

By 

John Dennett "geek of all trades" (Longmont, CO USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Jargon Watch: A Pocket Dictionary for the Jitterati (Hardwired) (Hardcover)

This isn't a book as much as a quick guide to the jaded language of the way new world. I enjoyed it a lot but it isn't a substantial read. Much fun to be had in keeping this one in your desk for those special Dilbert moments.

5.0 out of 5 stars English is a Liquid Language, February 6, 2001

By 

Robert Carlberg (Seattle) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Jargon Watch: A Pocket Dictionary for the Jitterati (Hardwired) (Hardcover)

...and Branwyn documents the steady drip, drip, drip of new words, from the already-well-established like webmaster, trolling, e-tailing and spam to cutting edge entries like prairie dogging, kevork, salmon day, keyboard plaque, stress puppy and seagull manager. Keep it by your square-headed girlfriend so you can liven up your e-mail tennis using TLAs with toy value better than dancing baloney. Just don't get caught or you might get uninstalled (decruited).