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[Blog] Freedom of speech: defining ‘social’ [link to post] #fb #in

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Hi Neville,

I enjoyed your contribution!

In my opinion, what you contribute @wordia.com primarily adds meaning to “wordia.com” (much in the same way that my writing here adds meaning to “nevillehobson.com”) — it may a small amount of data, but that doesn’t mean it’s insignificant in meaning. Taking all such contributions together may result in wordia.com becoming know to be similar to what people commonly refer to as a dictionary.

When people type something (such as “amazon”) into a search engine, that also has a meaning. Normally, they will want to find a certain kind of information. I myself have contributed to dictionary.co.uk, because I feel that the wisdom of the language will lead people to definitions of terms they wish to find clarification of, when the word “dictionary” is included in their search phrase (in many cases, people search for “dictionary” as a single word — much in the same way they might search for “amazon”).

This approach to language (i.e., language being defined by how it is used) has a very long tradition, and one of the most well-know philosohers of language championing this approach was Ludwig Wittgenstein.

And it is also at the heart of the wisdom of the language.

nmw