[Air-L] Metaphors in Technology

Gordon Carlson gordycarlson at gmail.com
Sun Jun 29 00:59:43 PDT 2008


Thank you all for your help so far.  I have added all your recent
comments to the list.

I will be honest, I love the Net and its slang but have never heard
the term epeen or a related one.  Wow.  The Internet is a scary
place/idea/destination/highway/car/tube.  Much like the Wild
West...ooh, need to add that one...

In case anyone is counting here is a newer list with the additions
thus far.  Thanks again and please do keep them coming!

-Gordy

active and inactive
bandwidth
blog - web log??
blogosphere
breadcrumbs
brick and mortar
broadband
broken record (not digital but still a technology metaphor)
bulletin boards
calculating (as in a person is cold and calculating)
car (and associated metaphors)
chat "rooms"
chatting
citizen of the internet - netizen
click
cloud (storage and computing)
connection/disconnection
cyberspace
dashboard
database
deckware
desktop
disease (as in internet as disease)
dial a touch phone
dial up internet access
dialog boxes
directory
domain
drop a packet
email
engine
extranet
files
filing system
firewall
flame
flaming
folders
forum
forward (as in to forward an email)
frames
frontier
garbage can
garbage in, garbage out
gateway
grinding (used in gaming to get lots of a resource)
harvesting
hit
homepage
hotspot
hub
inbox
information superhighway
instant messaging
intranet
link
lurking
menu
mining, especially data mining
mouse
navigation
objects (in programming)
offline
online
open (as in a file or email)
outbox
owning someone (as in to defeat someone in a game, not unique to
technology basis for pwned)
palette
portal
programmed or hardwired people
protocol
quad (a couple people mentioned this but I don't know why it is a
metaphor, any help?)
recycle bin
reply
reserving a "seat" for an online course
rolling (as in a character in DD)
rolling your own
run
search engine
server
shopping carts/basket
slides in powerpoint
space (a place you can go or occupy a volume)
spam
speed dial (Opera browser)
spyware
surfing
tabs
tag
tap (as in a line or phone which is no longer literal)
terminal
the computer going to "sleep" or hibernate
the whole concept of a virtual open house
transportation (and all associated internet metaphors)
tree
trojan horse
trolling
tubes (as in not a dump truck - ah, the great Senator Stevens...)
virus
windows
wiping out a team of players (gaming, not unique to technology)
world wide web
worm
word of mouse
browsing
scrolling up and down
computer hibernating
e-peen or e-penis (as in a slang term for ego online)
Internet male
word of mouse
ding (as in to gain a level in a game)
wild west



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