Talk:2722: Etymonline

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
Revision as of 20:28, 13 January 2023 by 172.71.167.236 (talk)
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Random fact: I recently finished reading etymonline.com from beginning to end. It taught me things about the English language that I didn't know that I didn't know. Darthpoppins (talk) 00:46, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Nice. 172.71.167.235 04:16, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Dear whomever wrote the current explanation, please take an English composition course. It's clear you mean well, but it's really hard to read your work. 172.71.158.216 04:44, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough; I'll try to clean it up Dextrous Fred (talk) 05:33, 11 January 2023 (UTC)
Also the complainer could take use of this being a wiki and make the changes himself ;-) --Kynde (talk) 09:56, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

In the comic, french word "étymologie" is incorrectly spelled "ethimologie" which is referred to as "Old French". I wonder whether that mistake was done on purpose ? 141.101.68.222 08:12, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

"Old French etimologie, ethimologie (14c., Modern French étymologie), from Latin etymologia, from Greek etymologia" from the Etymonline entry for "etymology"172.70.162.223 10:25, 10 January 2023 (UTC)
Given that it's over 350 years from now, it really ought to say 'from Old English etymology', with what we currently call Old English now being known as Really Old English.172.71.178.65 09:09, 10 January 2023 (UTC)
Or Ancient English. 172.68.51.160 14:47, 11 January 2023 (UTC)
With the comic revelling in the degredation of contemporary knowledge as future history passes (perhaps like here, especially in 2762), I don't think this relatively minor glitch is an error. Merely flavour. 172.71.242.141 12:21, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

In what is almost certainly not a coincidence, "etymology" and "blimp" are currently trending at #2 and #5, respectively, on etymoline.com as of right now (15:14, 10 January 2023 (UTC)) 172.70.110.236 15:14, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Agree. Now Blimp is #1 and Etymology #3 as of now. Have made a screen shot with the date and ponder to insert it in the explanation under a trivia. --Kynde (talk) 09:56, 11 January 2023 (UTC)
I have added the image. If someone could knows hot change the size of the image shown I would be happy. Not sure how to do that. --Kynde (talk) 10:28, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be "folk etymonline"? 172.68.35.26 18:57, 10 January 2023 (UTC) 172.68.35.26 18:57, 10 January 2023 (UTC) 172.68.35.26 18:57, 10 January 2023 (UTC) 172.68.35.26 18:57, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

I believe it uses "etymology" since that comment is from the perspective of some "present day" scholar, or Randall himself Dextrous Fred (talk) 05:32, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

What? No mention of the irony that an organization whose purpose is to preserve the history of words has accidentally done the opposite--supplanting and obscuring the word for the very thing they are trying to do?