It is also a fair description of the status of "Lingo," the most popular original series on the Game Show Network.
Fans noticed when the popular online game version of "Lingo" was withdrawn from GSN's Web site recently.
But instead of classical idioms, each canvas displayed a popular phrase taken from modern Chinese Internet lingo, including xi da pu ben and tu yang tu senpo, a mocking, phonetic reference to an outburst by former President Jiang Zemin during which he used English to accuse Hong Kong reporters of being "too young" and "too simple".
Print advertisements avoid the Met's standard typefaces, and television ads, with the title in blue neon and a tag line drawn from poker lingo ("Are you in?"), are running on popular cable shows, like Bravo's "Top Chef".
Even with its street-lingo name, Skechers is one of few popular fashion brands to take off among suburban teens without first being embraced by the rap crowd.
Yiddish, a Nation of Words, by Miriam Weinstein (Steer Forth Press, $26), is a popular history of the language that has been spicing the American lingo.
For many -- especially teen girls 12 to 14 -- the popular shows such as MTV's "The Hills" provide a universal lingo.
Any self-respecting youth culture should become so popular as to be reduced to a few sounds, items of fashion and lingo: the stabs of R U Sleeping?, the mad Moschino and "BOOOO".
Fiercely literate about the popular music not only of Brazil but also of North America, Mr. Santtana smashes Net-surfing lingo up against scenarios of the urban poor, trying to conjure a natural synthesis of ancient and futuristic.
"IS THERE ANY RAT THAT CAN INFECT MAC PC?" Nokia2mon2 asked in March 2014, using the infosec lingo for Remote Access Tool, software that can be used to control computers remotely and is popular among malicious hackers who want to break into victims' computers and steal their files or turn on their webcams.
