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Audio Cliche Usage Guide

To help all those in need, I propose the Audiogon Audio Cliche Usage Guide.
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Audio Cliche #1 - "My lost is your gain". Correct usage, "My loss is your gain".

Lost means missing, or no longer possessed. If you still own the unit, then you still possess the unit, and it is not lost.

Loss refers to the decrease in the amount of money resulting from re-selling the item at a lower price on Audiogon.
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Audio Cliche #2 - "I sold all my gears." Correct usage, "I sold all my gear."

Gears refers to several multi-toothed wheels used in motors and machinery.

Gear is a collective term that means all the components that comprise a system...like an audio system.
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Your turn...
tvad
tvad OP
9,467 posts
 
Jayboard, the use of the word "dampen" to describe reducing vibration in audio components drove me nuts until I looked it up in Webster's.

dampen (vb) dampening (vt): 1. to check or diminish the activity of: deaden, 2. to diminish progressively in vibration or oscillation.

I always thought the proper word was "damping", but Mr. Webster says otherwise.

Who knew?
mimberman
299 posts
 
In response to your question, Mdhoover: a solecism can mean almost any kind of mistake, but is most accurately used when referring to a grammatical aberrance.

Holy crap I'm a dork (he says sitting across from a rack of equipment oozing with shiny lights and numerous buttons).
tvad OP
9,467 posts
 
Was Norm Crosby the King of Solecisms?
jayboard
301 posts
 
Tvad, Holy vibrations! I did not know that! My spirit is dampened. I am turning my spray bottle on myself as we speak.

It looks like "damp" and "dampen" are pretty interchangeable. Here's the American Heritage dictionary on "damp."
DAMP
TRANSITIVE VERB: Inflected forms: damped, damp·ing, damps
1. To make damp or moist; moisten. 2. To extinguish (a fire, for example) by cutting off air. 3. To restrain or check; discourage. 4. Music To slow or stop the vibrations of (the strings of a keyboard instrument) with a damper. 5. Physics To decrease the amplitude of (an oscillating system).

Well, one less thing in this world to annoy me. That's a good thing.
unsound
6,115 posts
 
I plead guilty! I recently e-mailed someone appologizing for not doing so sooner because "things were hective". HECTIVE? What the hell was I talking about? Perhaps I was subconsiously proving a point. Nah, I'm just an idiot sometimes.
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