Apple and Microsoft hire cunning linguists over "app store"

Apparently Apple and Microsoft think that they are not good enough in the language department.

Microsoft invented something called International English and Apple is full of experts who email to explain that a story about an iPhone giving you cancer is not valid if you have not spelt it the way Steve Jobs says. However, these panels of geniuses are not enough when the two go for each other's throats over the word "app".

According to the Denver Post, which we get because we are interested in fencing, Microsoft and Apple have each hired linguists lately.

Apparently they need experts to prove that the word either is, or isn't a real word.

Apple insists that the word "app" is the invention of Steve Jobs and may only be uttered in connection with its cargo-cult.

We understand that it is used as a mantra as followers, their brains addled with Starbucks latte, queue for days for the latest shiny trinket to emerge from the Apple Store holy of holies.

Microsoft filed its latest argument with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which included the opinions of a linguistic expert who supports the software giant's argument that "app store" is generic and shouldn't be trademarked by Apple.

Apparently, the cunning linguist, with the splendid name Ronald Butters, said that an app store is simply a "'store at which apps are offered for sale,' which is merely a definition of the thing itself. It is a generic characterisation," he said.

However Apple's linguistic expert, Robert Leonard, insists that "App Store" is a proper noun and deserves to be trademarked, even though the words are generic when separated.

It does not get any more exciting than this in the world of linguistics.