Buzzword Bingo Ultimate Edition!

[Colin McGregor]

--- Mel Wilson <mwilson-4YeSL8/OYKRWk0Htik3J/w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> Giles Orr wrote:
> > My father had (has?) a 1970s Alfa Romeo car manual
> that includes
> > reference to a "ideogram illumination intensity
> adjustment
> > potentiometer."  This is actually entirely
> accurate, it's just not a
> > good choice of translation: they're talking about
> the dashboard light
> > dimmer.
> 
> When the first GE-115 computer came across from
> Olivetti, not too much 
> earlier than that, the company hired a commercial
> translating service 
> to do the documentation.  It came back with a lot of
> strange phrases 
> like that.  The only one to stick in my mind is
> "coherent elaboration 
> of flows".  They wound up installing the system by
> setting up the 
> mainframe, peripherals, and cables exactly as shown
> in the photos, 
> then hooking up the connectors that were nearest
> each other.
> 
> The Italian tech-speak for c.e.f. meant "logical
> file processing".
> 
> 	Mel.

I had a summer job at Olivetti Canada where I helped
do support on their first PC to be built around a
16-bit microprocessor. The original plan had been (a
plan killed by Olivetti USA in very short order) to
call this 16-bit machine the "Olivetti M16". For those
who don't get why Olivetti USA would object to the
name M16, keep in mind that the M16 is also the name
of the US Army's then (and current) standard infantry
rifle (part of a series of rifles dating back to the
WWII era M1 rifle)...

Case of due to Olivetti USA the machine in question
was renamed the M20, but periodically we in support
would see documents refferring to the M16...

Had they kept the original name it could have made for
some great advertising, like:

"Win the office automation war, get an Olivetti M16
and blow away the competition...".


Colin McGregor

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