There’s something special about TiVo that separates it from the other DVRs. It’s the experience. It’s that little sound it makes when you get to skip the commercials. “De-deet.” I love that sound. It means I won’t be inconvenienced. It means I’ll enjoy my TV more and I’ll be irritated less. But TiVo is doing more than satisfying my need for speed when it comes to watching TV. TiVo is changing the language used in my family. And as I write this post, I wonder if this is happening in other families too. Here are some things that I wouldn’t have said before I discovered TiVo. Am I alone?

Don’t worry, we’re TiVoing your show.
Translation: It’s ok, we’re recording the show you forgot to watch with our DVR right now. No worries, we can keep doing whatever we’re doing – you won’t be forced to watch live TV. Here, TiVoing (v) refers to the present action of recording a show.

We TiVo’d that show last week.
Translation: We recorded a show with the DVR last week. We’ll watch it at our convenience – unless it’s a season finale. If it’s a finale, our friends might accidentally tell us what happens. To prevent this, we’ll watch the show while it’s being TiVo’d so we’re current and if we miss anything, we’ll have back up. Here, TiVo’d (v) refers to the past action of recording a show or present action in the case of “being TiVo’d.”

Do we have any deet?
Translation: Do we have enough DVR recording so that we can keep skipping the commercials? Asked with longing tone, when the answer is No, we feel frustrated. Arg. Here, deet (n) refers to the amount of recording you have left. It stems from the word “de-deet” – the sound that the TiVo makes when you fast forward. Sometimes we say “Can I get a deet-deet?” Similar to the sound of “Can I get a what-what?” this calls the person with the remote to action.

Do you have a TiVo?
Translation: Do you have a DVR of any kind? People usually say Yes regardless of whether it’s really a TiVo (n). I replaced my TiVo with a different DVR a year ago to record HDTV. But it’s still a TiVo to me. When someone asks you for a Kleenex, you give them a tissue. It doesn’t matter if it’s really a Kleenex. Everyone knows what everyone’s talking about.

Am I alone here? Perhaps not. Just Google (v) bloatware, macintrash, wikification and flog to learn more new words. Language is not a static, lifeless set of words and rules. Language is a technology that evolves in the presence of life – in the presence of other technologies, like the web. If the development of language didn’t keep up with the development of other technologies, communicating would become so difficult that we wouldn’t be able to do our jobs. People who work in technology are most effective when we break out of the existing linguistic framework that we have come to know to describe new things that we see – when we use imagination to create new words (neologisms) for technologies that existing words cannot quite express. As Einstein, the Kleenex of geniuses, once said “Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited.”