Daily Briefing


What's New?

The Politics page has been updated to reflect some of the candidates anticipated to be on the ballot in Pennsylvania's Primary Election on April 23, 2024.

Hey! I read another book! Find out mwhat it was and read my review here.

If JLo picked you out of a crowd and proposed, would you say 'Yes?' Find out what Owen Wilson does in my review of Marry Me.

When the Philadehia Eag;es drafted Jason Kelce, no one predicted the legend he would become. In honor of his retirement, the Song of the Day for March is an early version of a song that would go on to become a rock 'n roll classic.

The annual Philadelphia Flower Show blooms in early March. You just have to find somewhere to park!

Word of the Year

A panel of linguists has decided the word that best reflects 2023 is enshittification, or the process by which digital platforms can go from user-friendly to unusable.

The American Dialect Society chose the Word of the Year on January 5, 2024 during a gathering in New York City.

Author Cory Doctorow popularized the term enshittification by using it in a post on his blog Pluralistic. He wrote, "Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. I call this enshittification."

"Enshittification is a sadly apt term for how our online lives have become gradually degraded," said Ben Zimmer, chair of the American Dialect Society New Words Committee. "From the time that it first appeared in Doctorow's posts and articles, the word had all the markings of a successful neologism, being instantly memorable and adaptable to a variety of contexts."

Other nominees for WOTY included (derogatory), used humorously to denote a word that may not normally be considered derogatory; ceasefire, a reference to calls to stop the fighting in the Israel-Hamas conflict; and babygirl, which refers to an older male character or celebrity seen as emotionally damaged or helpless. (derogatory) did come away the winner in the Most Useful/Most Likely To Succeed category.

You can read about these and other winners in the complete news release here.