‘AI’ takes Collins dictionary word of the year, ‘debanking’ makes shortlist

The Collins dictionary named ‘AI’ word of the year, describing AI-powered language models as “bursting into the public consciousness” and “much talked about” in 2023.

Artificial intelligence, more specifically its abbreviation “AI,” was crowned word of the year for 2023 in the Collins dictionary, one of the world’s earliest English-language dictionary publishers.

The Collins dictionary defines AI as “the modeling of human mental functions by computer programs.” The dictionary publisher described AI-powered language models as “bursting into the public consciousness” at the end of 2022.

It said AI has not only seen rapid development in 2023 but has also been “much talked about.” Collins wrote that AI is considered to be the “next great technological revolution.”

In addition to AI, Collins has had a particular interest in “digital culture” this year, shortlisting the word “de-influencing,” which it defines as an influencer using their online presence “to warn followers to avoid certain commercial products, lifestyle choices, etc.”

Among its other shortlisted words for the word of the year, Collins also had two finance-related words. “Debanking” made the list, which its officials define as “the act of depriving a person of banking facilities.”

Collins claimed this word made the list after a populist politician in the United Kingdom, Nigel Farage, claimed the Coutts bank tried to close his account due to his political affiliation. It wrote that:

“The issue was thrust into the spotlight and many others subsequently came forward to complain of having been debanked without explanation.”

Debanking has long been an issue tied to the crypto space. In April, United States Republicans in the House Financial Committee argued there is a record of a “coordinated strategy” of denying players in the digital asset industry access to banking facilities.

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Recently, the popular cryptocurrency exchange Binance has been up against debanking woes in Europe. The exchange said that users with its local banking partner Paysafe will not be able to trade euro spot trading pairs from Sept. 28 onward.

Collins also added the word “greedflation” to its shortlisted words: a compound word containing the words “greed” and “inflation.” It defined this as the use of inflation as an excuse to raise prices to artificially high levels in order to increase corporate profits.

The dictionary, based in the United Kingdom, said the U.K.’s current living crisis has been driven by inflation and claims many are convinced that “businesses are making excessive hikes in order to boost their profits, so-called greedflation.”

According to the U.S. inflation calculator, the country is currently facing an inflation rate of 3.7%, higher than the predicted 3.6% rate, though substantially down from the 2022 and 2021 rates of 6.7% and 7%, respectively.

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