The Most Popular Word in the World

Is OK the most popular word in the world? That depends on how you look at it. It's been argued that it's the most /spoken/ word in the world, but I have to call BS on that. The most spoken word has got to be "the" or "I" or the equivalent in Mandarin.

But Popular is a more subjective measure...and one that I'm choosing because I think that "OK"s adoption as a loanword is so extremely common. Now, there may be words that have been adopted into more languages...I'm thinking of "taxi." But "OK" is adopted for everyday conversational use, whereas "taxi" is only for specific situations. So that's the completely subjective argument I'm using to say that "OK" is the most popular world in the world.

So, something that didn't fit into the video...we think of memes as these new-fangled things, and definitely the way they spread now (and the speed at which they spread) is different, but acronyms from comical mis-spellings indicate that memes have been around for a long time, we just didn't call them memes. And the fact that the Democratic Party latched onto one to try and promote a candidate that had a less-than-american-sounding feels much more 2018 than 1838 to me. Van Buren was actually the first president who wasn't of British ancestry (or British himself) which was a big deal at the time.

Another thing I didn't get into the video...the creation of OK a little bit depended on our society becoming more text-based and literate. Telegrams helped this, but newspapers did as well. The extent to which these technologies revolutionized our society and our ability to communicate fast and wide is really hard to understand now, but is maybe the kind of thing we should be thinking about as our own world is being revolutionized by new communication technologies. We don't know, ultimately, what the affect will be. But they will be long-ranging and maybe invisible, just as OK has been for the last 175 years.

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[vlogbrothers]

Corrections:
1. Indian is not a language. There are like 30 languages spoken in India. Hindi is the most common.
2. I didn't make a TFIOS reference in this video because I had to cut it for time. Huge mistake. I take full responsibility.
3. I talk quite a bit about how "OK" is just two capital letters, but the more common (though more recent) spelling is "Okay" rather than "OK." OK, okay, and even O.K. are all OK, though "ok" is not generally accepted (though it is commonly used.) I chose to focus on "OK" because it's where "okay" comes from and it's an accepted (and very weird) word.
4. There are some other words that are just two capital letters. "TV" is one. THERE ARE NO ABSOLUTES!

[aftersunfilm]

I live in saudi arabia and people literally use OK more than they use arabic words

[marrus]

*falls* "are you okily dokily?"

[rehan]

I'm an immigrant from an eastern country and I've traveled quite a bit. It always surprised me how generic and entwined the word okay became to most languages. This video clears up my thoughts on this

[sanikabelpathak]

Indian is not a language..Hindi or other 22 other languages are spoken in India...so I just wanted to get this in notice..okay..😂

[Razbeariez]

I'm going to be painfully aware of all usage of the word "okay" for a very long time now. Thanks Hank 😂

[steffibkanvea]

This is great. As a Romanian also using “ok” on a regular basis, I did have a moment of confusion a few months ago about the word and I spent a good few hours trying to find an alternative in my language and trying to imagine what my people 200 years ago would have used instead.
So thank you for continuing my discussion with myself I guess.

[sky.llr]

To be honest Im here for these late 1830s memes👏

[sarahcostello]

The concept of it having come from an intentional wild misspelling, just for fun, is phenomenal. Humans have always been so frickin weird, and I love that.

[TheGerm]

Thanks for introducing me to the concept of a linguistic back channel.

[FromAnonymouse]

You can also preorder Hank’s new book AN ABSOLUTELY REMARKABLE THING and it’s not going to be ok. It’s going to be INCREDIBLE. I just know it. DFTBA!

[David]

I have heard it said that OK comes from the military term O.K., or 0 kills/casualties. Meaning, mission went neither good nor bad or, OK.

[SciencewithKatie]

Ah was hoping you'd address whether it's "OK" or "Okay", which is the okayest way of saying okay? I like okay.

[Mranton]

I heard that OK comes from the army where on a good day, a report would read "0 K", with K short for "Kills", meaning nobody died that day.

[nikofloros]

Man I missed these videos about just one very specific meaningfully meaningless thing. Love it! Also, just FYI to language geeks. The Greek phrase that may be the origin to OK is prounounced ’Ola kalA’ (with enphasis on the capital letters) not Ola kAla as Hank said it.

[leticiamalciano]

I live in Brazil, and here we use "okay" to EVEVRYTHING, like, "Do you want to go out today?" "Ok" or "thanks to help me with homework" "ok"
Everything is okay 😂😂

[psinaomi]

i've actually learned the origin of OK was in war, when soldier would come back to their base, the leader would inform how it went, and when none of their men was killed in battle, they would use OK - zero (0) killed :)

[amaramoss]

Hazel: Okay
Gus: Okay

My favorite quotes. I wish we all had an Augustus or Hazel.

[almonddaves]

I heard once that 'OK' came to be as a term used in the war, when soldiers reported there had been 0.k. (zero kills) on their lines.

[alexandremauricio]

I also heard a theory about O.K. coming from the World Word, where they counted the people that where missing each day that day. And in this case, a day with 0 (zero) Kills, was an O.K. day.