Better break it gently to the, um, people on Twitter: the word “Twitterverse” has joined perennial irritators “you know” and “like” on a list of words most likely to annoy people in conversation.
The finding comes via an annual Marist Poll in which 9 percent percent of adults (and 17 percent of those 18 to 29 ) picked “Twitterverse” to be most annoying. The word “whatever” topped the list for the fourth year in a row at 38 percent while “just sayin’” (10 percent) replaced “seriously” on this year’s list.
Foes of the Twitterverse will be unhappy to learn that the term is making inroads in the traditional media lexicon. The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Financial Times have all used it several times in the last year and the word got further headline traction with the arrival of Pope Benedict to Twitter. It’s clear that Twitter’s efforts at growing up have officially catapulted it into mainstream culture, annoying lexicon included.
Ironically, the biggest moment for “Twitterverse” may have come by way of The Atlantic which recently published a splendid list of the worst words of the year (shame, all you butt-chugging brogrammers who curate artisanal hipsters while discussing legitimate rape.)
In February, Atlantic correspondent Jeffrey Goldberg published a headline, “Twitterverse to new NYTimes Jerusalem bureau chief: stop tweeting!” The word got further traction months later after the Goldberg story led the New York Times scold-in-chief public editor to propose monitoring the journalist’s tweets. Yolo.
(Image by D.J.McGee via Shutterstock)
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