Issue 149 – July 2025
Coldplay inspires wordplay and other shenanigans
What do you call the wordplay that resulted in “Coldplayed”? It may be a case of “person as verb” – the practice of describing an action using a cultural reference.
Who hasn’t seen or heard about what happened to this couple at a recent Coldplay concert?
A kiss cam at the concert put a spotlight on software company Astronomer’s CEO with his arms around the company’s “Chief People Officer” (not his wife). The couple hastily separated and ducked for cover, bringing a new word into the world: “Coldplayed.” The internet explains this as “the act of being unintentionally exposed while cheating, especially in public, usually during major events.”
The clip has also spawned countless memes (like a play on Edvard Munch’s The Scream), videos (check out the Phillies Phanatic mascot at a baseball game in Philadelphia) and updated sayings (“Don’t do anything that you wouldn’t want on the [crossed out: cover of the New York Times] Jumbotron at a Coldplay concert” ).
What do you call the wordplay that resulted in “Coldplayed”? It may be “person as verb” – the practice of describing an action using a cultural reference. It’s a proud tradition.
MacGyvering earned its name after the lead character in the TV show MacGyver, which ran from 1985 to 1992. The term refers to people like the title character, who saves the day by making a gadget out of unlikely things, “such as creating a bomb out of chewing gum, dental floss, duct tape and a match.”
Boomers Rickrolled their friends, tricking them into clicking on a supposedly important link. The link instead took them to a video of Rick Astley singing his 1987 hit, “Never Gonna Give You Up.” Rick Astley himself has been Rickrolled by a friend.
Millennials and Harry Potter fans will appreciate that you can be Neville Longbottomed or just Longbottomed, referring to a character in the books. This means to “unexpectedly become significantly more attractive after going through puberty.”
Then there’s the Streisand effect, which is when attempts to hide, remove or censor information backfire by increasing public awareness of it. The term was coined after Barbra Streisand tried to suppress publication of a photo showing her clifftop residence in Malibu, taken to document coastal erosion. It didn’t work.
Brands are quite used to “product as verb,” even if they don’t necessarily like it. We don’t just search with Google, we Google something. Photographers don’t use Photoshop, they Photoshop a picture. We actively FaceTime and Zoom each other, FedEx packages and Uber to a destination.
Writer Mike Hoban calls this “the verbification of product names.” It “denotes a casual intimacy, a personal connection between a consumer and the product or the brand.” He thinks it’s a good thing.
Speaking of casual intimacy, the online frenzy over the previously happy Coldplayed couple seems to be dying down. But watch for “Coldplayed” in the 2025 Words of the Year.
Did you see any particularly funny takes on the Coldplay couple? Please share!
Related reading:
50 words you might not know are trademarked, like Band-Aids, Kleenex and Zamboni
Verbs that “started their lives in the English language with capital letters”
In the Red Jacket Diaries:
Interviewing and writing tips you might have missed, July edition
Dissonance and polarization are among the Words of the Year for 2024
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