"Unfriend" the Word of the Year

(AP)  What word sums up the year 2009?

How about "unfriend?"

That's the New Oxford American Dictionary's 2009 Word of the Year. It means to remove someone as a friend on a social networking site such as Facebook.

Each year Oxford University Press tracks how the English language is changing and chooses a word that best reflects the mood of the year.

Oxford lexicographer Christine Lindberg says "unfriend" has "real lex-appeal."

Finalists for 2009 also included "netbook," a small laptop, and "sexting," the sending of sexually explicit texts and pictures by cell phone.

[barbaram99]

sorry about 2 times but I try not to. Yet who messes with our proper english. every year they come with some odd ball word that they think is cool. Unfriend that can't be a computer term.

[barbaram99]

I 'member yesrs ago that my english teacher had a problem with certain words that were not proper english. Mind ye I am a Maine hillbilly with poor schooling. Yet this was 'fore computers were everywhere. E-mail was unheard of. There are words that are plain dumb. Unfriend is one of them. Unfriendly is proper english. I am awere this is not a english class. I realise too that some words make it and one of them is a netbook. That is fine. Is others comfortable using words that make no sense. Some words are out dated or their meanings that change. Sexting is a word that is dumb. Who dreams up useless expessions etc. They got lazy asre teachers, Hip hop don't help who can't be bothered to speak english but use street talk, In our day most teens in my age grupe said groovey alot. That is dumb. Some new words make sense. rf35, I am 55 and I have to wonder who dreams up such non sense. Some words are now common, some are just odd. unfriend is not a complete word if ye ask me.
Too lazy to write unfriendly.

[barbaram99]

I 'member yesrs ago that my english teacher had a problem with certain words that were not proper english. Mind ye I am a Maine hillbilly with poor schooling. Yet this was 'fore computers were everywhere. E-mail was unheard of. There are words that are plain dumb. Unfriend is one of them. Unfriendly is proper english. I am awere this is not a english class. I realise too that some words make it and one of them is a netbook. That is fine. Is others comfortable using words that make no sense. Some words are out dated or their meanings that change. Sexting is a word that is dumb. Who dreams up useless expessions etc. They got lazy asre teachers, Hip hop don't help who can't be bothered to speak english but use street talk, In our day most teens in my age grupe said groovey alot. That is dumb. Some new words make sense. rf35, I am 55 and I have to wonder who dreams up such non sense. Some words are now common, some are just odd. unfriend is not a complete word if ye ask me.
Too lazy to write unfriendly.

[rf35]

Isn't there some group that's charged with approving new words for the English language? I understand that language can evolve and I suppose if a word becomes common enough it could warrant entry into a dictionary, but some of these netspeak (is THAT a real word?) words that are cropping up are not used by an especially large portion of the population. I'm no cave-dwelling technological retard, but I've never heard of "unfriend" until now. Sounds like something randomly made up to get attention for the Oxford Dictionary.

[bann65]

Thsi sounds like a word the goofy libs thought up. Soemthing negative, what do you expect? LOL.

[lmartink]

Stupid comment. Poor spelling. Irrelevant. Other than that, it is an intelligent post.