SoSlang Crowdsources a Dictionary
Stephen E. Arnold writes:
Here’s a surprising and interesting approach to dictionaries: have users build their own. SoSlang allows anyone to add a slang term and its definition. Beware, though, this site is not for everyone. Entries can be salty. R-rated, even. You’ve been warned.
I would compare this approach:
speakers -> usages -> dictionary
to a formal dictionary:
speakers -> usages -> editors -> formal dictionary
That is to say a formal dictionary reflects the editor’s sense of the language and not the raw input of the speakers of a language.
It would be a very interesting text mining tasks to eliminate duplicate usages of terms so that the changing uses of a term can be tracked.