Looks like the tech revolution has twisted the use of a term that used to actually have a specific meaning.  Seems one current use is completely different from what the term actually means.

“Live.”

When used in reference to television, when a show is referred to as “live,” it used to mean that it was being broadcast at the same time it was being produced.  The Ed Sullivan Show used to be broadcast live.  Saturday Night Live is still being broadcast live in the eastern and central time zones.  Many sports events are broadcast “live.”

Now the term is frequently used for something else, something different – something that is not “live” at all.

For instance, I’ve recently heard promos for television shows that urge one to view some program “live.” For instance: “Watch ‘The Fosters’ ‘live’ this Monday night at 8 o’clock.” Or, “(such and such show) is live this Wednesday.”

These requests from advertisers are not suggestions that the show will be shown at the same time that it’s produced. Rather, they are subtle pleas to potential viewers to watch the show when it is broadcast, in its normal time slot, instead of recording it via DVR for later viewing at a more convenient time.

While I understand the harm that recording shows for later viewing does to the value of the advertising — as viewers may now simply fast forward through, and skip, the commercials — the suggestion that a show will be “live” seems more than a little misleading.  At the least, it is confusing.  It is certainly not the correct use of the word.

It is not too much to ask that the broadcast entities come up with another word.

I’ve been spending some time lately thinking about diagramming sentences. Not much time. I’m not a total freak.

My children tell me they didn’t much like diagramming sentences in their classes at school. Funny, I remember being the only person in my junior high class that enjoyed the activity. I found diagramming a refreshingly mathematical aspect of English class in eighth grade. A couple years ago, I bought a book on the subject and read it cover to cover. Thank you to my teacher, Miss Langston. (I think that was her name.)

Today, more of this waxing nostalgic was brought on by something I heard on Morning Edition:

“Here in Afghanistan last Saturday millions of Afghans braved threats by the Taliban to vote in record numbers for their next president.”

Now, I’m not going to diagram this sentence, as I don’t think this software supports the lines and diagonals I’d need (alas, another thing that the overuse of word processing programs might put out to pasture), but I think the order of the words deserves some examination.

Although I was half asleep when I heard it, I immediately asked myself, “Why is it that the Afghan people took as a threat the suggestion that the Taliban might vote in record numbers for their next president?” Were the members of the Taliban not properly registered to vote?

One might also ask, “What exactly did the Afghans do to demonstrate their bravery in the face of the Taliban threat to vote?”

But, these things are probably not what the NPR co-host was getting at, eh?

I suspect that what she was saying was that the Afghans demonstrated bravery by voting for their next president (and, some, very possibly, that candidate’s opponents), despite some threats by the Taliban.

And again, I assume that the person who reported this story — presumably the co-host herself — actually wrote down what she was going to say, and read it, before she said it on the air. One must question, I think, whether there was an editor involved; and ask why that editor didn’t do his/her job and change the copy to reflect what the co-host was actually trying to get across.

Perhaps: “Despite Taliban threats (of violence, revenge, retribution?), last Saturday millions of Afghans bravely voted in record numbers in an election to decide the next president of Afghanistan.”

That was easy.