I was watching a cooking show the other day and the host was careful to refer to something as an “Individual Serving Beverage Holders” which confused the hell out of me until I realized I was looking at a Keurig K-cup pod. It got me to suddenly think of all the weird times you see ads or TV shows refer to popular products that just happen to have distinctive names. Another example is “Novelty flying disc” for a Frisbee, which itself got parodied in the Simpsons (which I’m sure is where most of you have heard it but looking up NFD on Amazon gets you all the cheap frisbees you can order)
What are some other awkwardly generic names you’ve see for popular products?
Not quite the same thing, but it always amuses me to see commercials where the Super Bowl is referred to as the “Big Game”. Supposedly the NFL won’t let you use the Super Bowl if you’re trying to sell a commercial product. Also, you sometimes hear the NCAA basketball tournament (“March Madness”) referred to as the “March Tournament” for similar reasons.
I’ve heard that too. IANAL seems to me if you said something like “This is the Super Bowl of sales on new furniture” it would be a problem. If you said “stock up on chips and dips for the Super Bowl” you’d be okay.
Maybe not quite what you are looking for, but used to be on the late night interview shows, they would say that the guest had a show “on another network.” They seem to have stopped bothering with that now and actually just say that the damn thing is on CBS or whatever–don’t know when the transition happened.
It was very common in 50s-60s TV commercials when it was felt that you should never mention a competitor’s name. Thus Bufferin would demonstrate how fast it was by an animation that showed Bs (for Bufferin) racing As (for something else ) to the pain, and margarine commercials would compare themselves to “the high-priced spread.”
Not quite what the OP is talking about but I encountered a product the other day in the dairy case at the supermarket called “Land O’ Lakes Fresh Buttery Taste Spread.” It looks like advertising but that’s actually the official name of the product. Still, I guess it’s a better name than “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter!”
In the United States, we subdivide what British people call “jam” into “jelly” (made from fruit juice), “jam” (made from fruit pieces), and “preserves” (made from whole fruit).
That means we don’t have the term “jelly” available for that wiggly dessert. We usually call it by a brand name, “Jell-O.”
But how do we avoid the brand name? The only term available is “gelatin dessert,” but that seems kind of vague.
“Waste bin” or “waste receptacle” also seem too vague to substitute for “Dumpster.”
Scotch Tape or Sellotape – “transparent pressure-sensitive office tape”
Bubble Wrap – “inflated cushioning”
And who says “slide show presentation software” for “PowerPoint”?
Not really awkward, but on (Ask) This Old House, they always talk about going to the ‘Home Center’. Once they’re there, it’s row after row of bright orange shelving. To anyone that’s ever been to Home Depot, Lowes, Ace, Menards etc, there’s not really a question about where they are.
I understand that they can’t (or won’t, without being paid) say Home Depot. I just always think it’s funny.
I think the idea behind it that that only one beer/car/chip/etc brand gets to be the “official” brand of the Super Bowl, so no one else is allowed to say it since it my imply they’re the official brand. Of course, some people do take it too far and go “we can’t say the Super Bowl!” even outside of commercial context.
I always smile when I see Lego knock-offs going out of their way to describe themselves as “interlocking brick building systems” or something similar, and “compatible with all leading interlocking brick systems” without saying that they’re Lego knockoffs that work with real Legos.
That would also likely be problematic, because you are still calling upon the goodwill associated with the Super Bowl to give your own product a boost.
Paizo (a game publisher) makes a swords-and-sorcery role-playing game called Pathfinder; it competes directly against Dungeons & Dragons, which was the world’s first fantasy role-playing game.
When Paizo makes reference to D&D, they rarely, if ever, call it by its name. Here’s an ad for an upcoming Pathfinder release from Paizo, which will feature a set of rules for adapting the adventure to 5th Edition D&D. In the ad, they refer to 5E D&D as “the fifth edition of the world’s oldest roleplaying game.”
Polytetrafluoroethylene. Teflon is a trademark of Chemours, a company recently spun off from du Pont.
Poly(methyl methacrylate). Plexiglas is a trademark of Rohm & Haas.
Expanded polystyrene foam. Styrofoam is a trademark of Dow Chemical. Dow uses the name to refer to building insulation products, never to coffee cups and food containers.
I’ve also heard them called “Roll-off containers.” I believe Dumpster is no longer a live trademark though, so feel free to call them what they are.
A local radio show is sponsored by Microsoft. More than once when a guest mentions “googling” something the hosts correct them “don’t you mean Bing it?”
) to the pain, and margarine commercials would compare themselves to “the high-priced spread.”