Buzzword compliant

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In the technology industry, being buzzword compliant means that a particular product supports features that are currently in vogue. Examples would include:

• client-server products in the early 1990s,
• CORBA and COM based programs in the mid-1990s,
• Java-based programs in the late 1990s, and
• SOA - service-oriented architecture
• AJAX or Web 2.0 today.

Buzzword compliance is a modern version of the old practice of being checkbox compliant: making sure that a product gets a check in all the common feature lists in reviews in computer magazines. Today much software is sold as custom development or to venture capitalists, so the marketing is aimed at other technical staff (typically middle management of the technical staff) as opposed to consumers reading reviews. For these reviewers, many of them only semi-literate in technical terms, the use of buzzwords makes a product sound more interesting. Among the technically literate, the phrase is sometimes used in a sardonic way, as in: "I have no idea what it does, but it sure is buzzword compliant", implying that perhaps the effort on the product has gone into marketing and public relations rather than the technology.

Technical staff, and those involved in recruiting and hiring them, also speak of a résumé or CV being "buzzword compliant" when it contains a large number of such terms. This can be a matter of some practical importance to a job-seeker. In many large organizations, those who receive and evaluate applications for employment will not be familiar with the domain of the job, and therefore can only assess buzzword compliance with the job description when deciding which applications the hiring manager will see. (Organizations which are highly buzzword compliant may give the hiring manager a fancier title such as human resource manager.)

See also

• Buzzword
• Buzzword bingo
• Golden hammer
• Power word