My supervisor pointed out a very annoying habit I had formed when writing technical documents, best summed up below:

"It would be difficult to find a page of governmental, military, or academic writing that doesn't have on it the word utilize. It must be one of the most over-utilized words in the world. It seems as though people out to impress people with the significance of what they're doing use utilize when they should use use.

Utilize is not an elegant variation of the word use; it has its own distinct meaning. When you utilize something, you make do with something not normally used for the purpose, e.g., you utilize a dime when the bloody screwdriver is nowhere to be found. If the screwdriver were there, you'd use it, not utilize a stupid dime for the purpose. Use use when you mean use, and utilize only when it's properly used to mean--to use something not normally used. The computer went off-line, so they utilized Mr. Wang's abacus, the one he liked to use. Despite the temporary breakdown, the computer's use-rate was up (not its utilization-rate)."

Cheney, "Getting the words right" (1983)

You will now probably notice this subtle verbiage in most everything you read!

posted at: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 10:19 | in /code/badcode | permalink | add comment (5 others)