Social media breaks dictionary rule, tweet now in OED

The social media has become very powerful and it made even editors at Oxford English Dictionary to break their rule. The word 'tweet' (with lower case 't') will now be part of OED as verb and noun.

With the addition of 'tweet' the OED seems to have broken its own rule that a word needs to be in use for 10 years to be considered for inclusion in the dictionary. The Twitter social network just turned seven in March this year.

The force of social media was also evident with the expansion of word 'follow' (verb). Its definition now includes the tracking of a person or organization on a social media site like Facebook or Google+.

'Crowdsourcing', 'live blog', 'flash mob', 'geekery' and 'dad dancing' also earned a place in an OED now containing 823,000 entries.

Crowdsourcing is defined as the practice of obtaining information or services by soliciting input from a large number of people, typically via the internet and often without offering compensation.

A flash mob is a large group of people organized by means of the internet, or mobile phones or other wireless devices, who assemble in public to perform a prearranged action together and then quickly disperse.

The live blog is defined as continual textual coverage of a live event.

The term "3D printer" was also added to the Oxford English Dictionary. The dictionary defined "3D Printer" as a means to create something by printing out layer upon layer of material. "Search engine optimization," defined as the practice of trying to keep a website high on lists of search engine results, also made the list.

Other current technology additions to the dictionary include 'big data, e-reader, mouseover, redirect' as a noun and 'stream' as a verb.

Some of the notable additions for the quarterly update released on Friday include 'binge drinking' and 'binge drinker, BFF (Best Friend/Friends Forever), dad dancing, fiscal cliff, to have a cow,' and 'pay day loan'.

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