The word, featured in the Amazon chief’s post about the National Enquirer, has raised a few eyebrows.
Jeff Bezos’s explosive blog post about the National Enquirer produced dozens of talking points – but for some the key takeaway was the Amazon chief’s use of the word “complexifier”.
In a post published on Medium in which Mr Bezos said he was the target of “extortion and blackmail” from the tabloid’s publisher American Media Inc, he also described the difficulties owning the Washington Post has caused him.
I’ve written a post about developments with the National Enquirer and its parent company, AMI. You can find it here: https://t.co/G1ykJAPPwy
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) February 7, 2019
“My ownership of the Washington Post is a complexifier for me,” Mr Bezos wrote. “It’s unavoidable that certain powerful people who experience Washington Post news coverage will wrongly conclude I am their enemy.”
While details of the alleged blackmail made headlines all over the world, for some it was this sentence that stood out.
It's, like, 47th on the list of amazing things about the Bezos post on Medium, but:
"The Post is a complexifier for me"
— Jim Tankersley (@jimtankersley) February 7, 2019
so far I've gotten far enough into the Bezos post to see him invent the word "complexifier"
— Ariel Edwards-Levy (@aedwardslevy) February 7, 2019
Bezos uses the word “complexifier” in his thing and I shudder at how many ideation meetings were called to help birth it as acceptable brand doublespeak
— Drew Magary (@drewmagary) February 7, 2019
Honestly, in addition to everything else, I appreciate the addition of the word "complexifier" to the lexicon today.
— Chris Geidner (@chrisgeidner) February 7, 2019
Complexifier sounds like a word a Bush official would've invented in a presser about the Iraqi insurgency in 2003.
— Osita Nwanevu (@OsitaNwanevu) February 8, 2019
Some people were outraged by the use of the unusual word.
I thought I knew what rage was and then I read the term “complexifier”
— Jason (@longwall26) February 8, 2019
Not everyone saw the problem though.
“complexifier” is a great word.
— John Durant (@johndurant) February 7, 2019
Others just thought there were better ways of putting the information across.
“Source of complications” > “complexifier”
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) February 7, 2019
Can you use the word in a sentence?
Having three teenagers at home is a complexifier for me. What’s a complexifier for you?
— Peter Lattman (@peterlattman) February 8, 2019
But for anyone worried about whether or not “complexifier” is a real word, an adjudication wasn’t long in coming.
It's a perfectly good derivative noun.https://t.co/MxrhL5djfu
— Peter Sokolowski (@PeterSokolowski) February 8, 2019
Peter Sokolowski, a lexicographer at Merrian-Webster dictionaries, said it was a “perfectly good derivative noun”.
Meanwhile, another word – “apoplectic” – which was used to describe Enquirer publisher David Pecker in the post, trended in Merrian-Webster’s searches.
📈Searches for 'apoplectic' are spiking from a Jeff Bezos post about David Pecker. https://t.co/m04uXmGMBZ
— Merriam-Webster (@MerriamWebster) February 8, 2019
And Dictionary.com offered its own lexicographical take on the story.
The word "dick" has been slang for a 🍆 since the 19th century.
The word "pecker" has been slang for the same thing since at least 1902.
— Dictionary.com (@Dictionarycom) February 7, 2019