Martin Banks, Personal Computer World 06/86 - checked

June 1986

I can always remember being told at school something in which I took great comfort. It was as follows: language is a living thing that is always vibrant, always changing. Grammar is just the dead remains of what language used to be.

That, I always thought, was one of the most poetic justifications for being lousy at grammar I had ever heard. At the time, it was a justification I needed desperately, for grammar and me seemed to be in entirely different worlds most of the time. (There is absolutely no need for any one to write in with comments about the present day, thank you very much; I am aware of my limitations).

The point of this little homily was, and still is, that language and the way in which we use it will change. The same often applies to words and their meaning. More specifically, it applies to what we think we mean with the current common usage of a word. This can lead to some interesting problems when the original meaning of the word is remembered.

The computer industry has, over the years, been a splendid exponent of this art of taking a word and fundamentally changing its meaning. More recently it has also adopted the use of words that attempt to imply far more about a product than is there, if only because of the fact that if it wasn't there the company making it wouldn't be selling it. See, its all quite clear really.

Here, to put it more simply, are two specific examples: `sophisticated' and `professional'.

These two words are used with sometimes stunning regularity by the computer industry, especially in advertising copy. You know the type of thing...."the most sophisticated xxx", or.... "a highly professional yyy". Phrases and statements such as this abound in the copy of advertisements to be seen in magazines such as this august organ.

We read them blithely and know what the advertisers mean, or at least we think we know what we think they mean. The trouble is, words such as these have become such common currency that their meanings have become lost, if not to the Oxford English Dictionary then to most of the people reading computer advertisements.

Take the word `sophisticated' for example. What does it mean to you when you see it in an advert? The typical response is likely to be that the word is implying that the product in question is really rather clever. It will be able to do all the things that you thought it might, given the limitations of its applications area, and some other things as well. Most of all, it is a word that implies something worth buying.

A quick delve into the dictionary however, will show that this could be little further from the truth. `Sophisticated' comes from the word sophism, and this means a false argument or something intended to deceive. Search just a little bit further and one finds that a sophist is a fallacious reasoner, while sophisticate means to deprive of natural simplicity, or make artificial by worldly experience.

These, it would seem to me, are not the sort of qualities one would naturally look for in a product, an applications program for example.

It is true that the word also carries connotations of complication, especially when related to a product or `thing'. But even here there is the implied expectation that the complication is necessary and serving a valid purpose.

This may well be the case in practice, but let's look at some examples and use the original meaning of the word. Lotus says, in a recent add for 1-2-3 Release 2, that it is more powerful and sophisticated than the original. Can this be taken to mean that it is even fuller of false arguments and fallacious reasonings, is even more complicated and less naturally simplistic? Worst of all, does it mean it is even more artificial?

Somehow I don't quite think this is what they actually meant.

Take some other examples. A company called RMS is advertising a sophisticated curtain estimating package called Curtain Master: just imagine what this might produce in the way of finished goods given a little bit of false argument in the algorithm..."I don't have windows the size of Wembley stadium!!!". "No sir, I understand that sir. But just think, it gives you plenty of material for a nice hem."

Johnson Microcomputers are using `that' word in a training advert. Just imagine.... "if you've made a mess of the program line you are coding all you do is press that key marked `Return' and it will take you back to the beginning so you can start again." Or, "using a database management system is easy". Come to think of it people do t end to say that, anyway.

Then, there is that word `professional'. This, as we all know, means belonging to or connected with a profession. From a quick scan of recent adverts, this is the in-word at the moment. While its current use has not twisted its meaning completely, as with `sophisticated', its use has come to imply something extra-special about a product that, if the reader thought about it, should be there in the product all the time.

I'll give you an example. Both Digital Research with GEM and Atlanta Data Systems with Overhead Express apply the word to their graphics packages. GEM, for example, has a professional polish, which could taken to mean the packaging comes from a furniture restorer. Overhead Express is professional looking which probably means its meant to be the art critic of The Times.

In both cases they mean the quality of the graphics produced is high, as one might expect from a professional artist. Well, isn't that what one ought to expect? Why spend good money on a graphics package that has damn-all artistic talent?

Once you start looking at the words used in computer adverts and think about some of their real or alternative meanings, they actually get quite interesting. Maxell, for example, writes about the `staggering' 114 tests each floppy disk has to pass, while Psion's Chess program is `brilliant'.

I think this could become a new spectator-sport for people in the industry, something to do in the evenings when the disk-drive has broken and there is only Dallas on the TV. Why not read the adverts and see what you can really make them mean. Then, if it isn't dangerous or illegal, act it out in public. How about a prize for the best one-act advert to appear at the PCW Show in September.....anyone game?

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