Topic: Filler

NPR featured a segment on the filler word "um," describing it as a "mighty building block of conversation" used for turn-holding and tone-softening. The report traces the word's history back to 1604 and notes its increasing use in informal social media captions. The hosts mock the academic seriousness applied to a common speech habit.

An FDA advisory committee reported that the Moderna vaccine caused temporary facial swelling in participants with dermal fillers. The reaction suggests the immune response triggered by the mRNA vaccine identifies substances like hyaluronic acid or PMMA as foreign threats.

The decline of traditional broadcast media is attributed to repetitive "filler" content and a failure to cover international stories like the Yellow Vest protests. A comparison is made between modern news broadcasts and 1950s newspapers, which are described as being significantly denser with information. The hosts argue that the current media landscape is crumbling due to cord-cutting and the rise of alternative platforms like podcasts.

John C. Dvorak addresses a listener email criticizing his frequent use of the phrase "you know" during the podcast. The hosts discuss their mutual habit of catching each other's verbal tics and lip-smacking. They compare modern filler words to 1970s speech patterns and millennial slang.

The hosts mock a CBC tech reporter's explanation of algorithms, focusing on his excessive use of the word "right" as a filler. The segment critiques the media's inability to explain complex technical systems without relying on vague terminology and "stop words."

The hosts review a report from producer JJ Meyer regarding the excessive use of the phrase "of course" in previous episodes. Adam Curry admits to using the filler 37 times in episode 916 and discusses his efforts to eliminate the habit. They compare this to other common verbal tics like "yeah-no" and "uh" frequently heard in media broadcasts.

Adam Curry announces the registration of SlaveSpeak.com to host a list of linguistic filler words and "performatives." They critique the overreliance on the word "amazing" in restaurant reviews and television commentary. The hosts invite listeners to submit more examples of "unneeded wordage" that contribute to a decline in precise communication.

John C. Dvorak hosts a special filler episode of No Agenda while Adam Curry is on vacation. Dvorak introduces two pre-recorded interviews featuring former Apple CEO John Sculley and microphone designer Bob Heil. Listeners are encouraged to support the show at dvorak.org/na despite the pre-recorded format.

A listener reported a psychological phenomenon where she sees hexagons in everyday objects and print media, claiming they are appearing more frequently. This obsession with patterns is compared to the proliferation of linguistic fillers like "yeah, no" and "to an extreme." These repetitive phrases are noted as becoming ubiquitous in modern speech.

In a "Catch the Gaffe" segment, New York Times columnist David Brooks is caught using the contradictory filler phrase "yeah, no." The hosts analyze the evolution of the phrase as a diminutive version of "you know" or a way to signal a transition in thought. They conclude that such linguistic fillers are becoming increasingly common in political commentary.

The hosts play a "strange" 30-second commercial for Tide Sport that features a mother talking about the smell of her son's clothes during puberty. They dismiss the clip as "filler" used to transition between segments.

The increasing use of the word "so" as a conversational filler and attention-grabbing device is identified as a disturbing linguistic trend. The hosts admit to their own struggle with this habit and compare it to other repetitive phrases like "fact of the matter." The trend is noted as being particularly prevalent in social media interactions and broadcast interviews.