Millionth English word is announced

The millionth word in the English language is Web 2.0, says a US web monitoring firm.

Texas-based Global Language Monitor (GLM) searches the internet for new words, and once it has been used 25,000 times, it gives it official word status. GLM makes its money from tracking web coverage for corporations.

Web 2.0 beat Jai ho, N00b and slumdog to become word 1,000,000.

Publishers of proper dictionaries have somewhat more stringent criteria for allowing the inclusion of a word and say it is impossible to say exactly how many words the English language contains, including how long it has actually been in use rather than how often illiterate imbeciles on Twitter type it.

Lexicographers estimate that the average fluent English speaker would only use between 20 and 40,000 words.

Web 2.0 has certainly been around for a few years, so it scores on that count. However, Web 2.0 doesn't actually exist in reality and it's not even a word - it's a phrase. The first bit has certainly been around since spiders were invented and the second bit isn't even a word. It's a bloody number.

So it's not a word; it isn't new; what it describes doesn't exist; half of it is a number; and it isn't word 1,000,000.

But, apart from that, GLM has got it spot on.

Now I got to memorize 20-40 thousands words just to be average. It's tough being an English speaking person.