Two Wrongs

“Look, honey—a company that recommends vacations for couples!”

“Wait—Twocation is a blend of ‘two’ and ‘vacation,’ isn’t it?”

Sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Vacationer. In defiance of logic and normal English pronunciation conventions, Twocation is a blend of “Twitter” and “location.” It’s an app that shows you where in the world your Twitter followers are. I’m guessing that David Barker, the app’s creator, wants us to rhyme the first O with “woe.”

Well, good luck with that! Because if you speak English, I’m willing to bet money that you’ll see “twocation” as two plus the suffix -cation. If you’re a scientist, you might start speculating about dual cations. Otherwise, you’ll probably think a “twocation” is the latest playful spin on “vacation,” after staycation, daycation, selfcation, mancation, gaycation, naycation, and shave-cation.

And you’ll definitely read that first syllable as two.

That’s because the only English word that starts with t-w-o is, in fact, two, which—also in defiance of logic and normal pronunciation conventions, but with centuries of history on its side—rhymes with “true.” We just don’t have any precedent in the language for a “two-” word in which the W is pronounced and the vowel is long.

Lots of Twitter apps and add-ons have had names that begin with TW: Twhirl, Twidroid, Twitterzon, Twistori, Twitpic. Some of the names are silly, but for sheer getting-in-its-own-way-ness, none of them beats Twocation.

(Hat tip: Mary Sullivan.)

Comments

[Steve Hall]

Ayup...looks like a fail to me. I was pretty excited when I first saw that logo...as my wife and I travel a lot; it could have been something right up our alley.

Alas.

[Jonathon]

There are already relatively few words that start with [tw] in English. There are none that I can find in the OED that start with [two] (and I mean pronunciation, not spelling). No English speaker is going to see that and pronounce it as intended.

[Ben Zimmer]

'Twould be a shame to forget about "twoc" (British slang for "steal [a car]"), or the late great artist Cy Twombly.

[Elisabeth@YCCII]

Agreed.

I have the same problem with Pinterest. I assume that it's supposed to be pronounced "PIN-trest" because of the act of pinning pins, but I can't help but say "PINT" as the first syllable.

[Nancy Friedman]

@Ben: OK, OK, wise guy! But in all those examples the O is short. I'll grant you "'twon't," as in "'Twon't do, milady!" but archaic contractions really shouldn't count.

@Elizabeth: I always think of it as Pinteresque, which seems like something high-minded but not much fun.

[Jessica]

I'm sorry, all I can think of with this silly pronunciation is Lili Von Shtupp - "it's twue, it's twue!"