Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2024 September 22

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September 22

Attention theft, Mise-en-scène, and Narrowcasting

I see a user added Attention theft, Mise-en-scène, and Narrowcasting to the "see also" section of False dilemma. In what way might these make sense? Are they perhaps all commonly used as metaphors in ways I don't know? On the face of it, attention theft is something adverts do, mise-en-scène is a term from stagecraft and means "environment", and narrowcasting is targeted broadcasting. I suspect some excessive lateral thinking inspired all this - or are some of these terms used in ways that are indeed related to false dilemmas?  Card Zero  (talk) 14:26, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

That was added in February, by a user who has since been indef'd.[1] You should be safe in expunging those items. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:59, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

Done. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:52, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

Ah, thank you kindly.  Card Zero  (talk) 15:13, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

Resolved

Convergent use

There was a mass shooting in Alabama this morning, apparently done using a machine gun. The mayor of Birmingham was quoted saying:[2]

This is not the first occasion, unfortunately, in 2024 where we’ve seen the style of weapons, the number of bullets on the scene, possibly convergent use, etcetera, for automatic weapons being used in our streets,

What does "convergent use" mean here? Web search and wiktionary don't help. 2601:644:8581:75B0:0:0:0:C078 (talk) 20:44, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

You could maybe try asking him? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:34, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

The mayor of Birmingham? Yes I'm sure he'd love to take a call from a rando like me, asking something like that. 2601:644:8581:75B0:0:0:0:C078 (talk) 21:45, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

This source has the mayor saying "possibly converted automatic weapons". I suppose that he may have misspoken, but that this is what he meant to say.  --Lambiam 21:52, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

That would make sense: semi-automatics converted (illegally) into automatics. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:57, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

On the audio here, at 3:07, the mayor does say "convergence use", a term he repeats later. A plausible scenario is that the editors of AL.com called the bureau of the mayor for clarification and received this correction in reply. Alternatively, a (corrected) transcript may have been sent to news outlets.  --Lambiam 22:12, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

In contrast to semiautomatic weapons unethically represented as automatic by sensationalist news broadcasts. —Tamfang (talk) 03:02, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

Aha, yeah, some kind of garbled machine transcription maybe. That does make sense. I was thrown because I did find a few hits for "convergent use" by web search, but none made sense in this context. Thanks. 2601:644:8581:75B0:0:0:0:C078 (talk) 00:05, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

In tonight's evening news, the report used the term "converted", which makes sense. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:48, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

It was not a garbled machine transcription. On the audio of the video I linked to above, the mayor can clearly be heard saying "convergent use".  --Lambiam 12:08, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

If it's the same mass shooting reported here, it apparently involved multiple people shooting at a single principal victim. That would certainly fit a description as "convergent". I was reminded of the description of military "time on target" weapon fire that I coincidentally read in a war novel just the other day. --142.112.149.110 (talk) 04:11, 28 September 2024 (UTC)