March 5, 2001

9:38 AM

In what appears to be a suicide mission, Gateway announced it is backing away from lucrative services and software (which accounted for 100 percent of its fourth-quarter earnings) in favor of refocusing on computer sales, an area that recently has not made a dime for the company.
posted by shauna (25 comments total)

If they did go out of business, it'd be good riddance to bad rubbish. I've owned multiple Gateway servers and laptops before, but the quality of the product and the inexcusable lack of service that has accompanied my most recent Gateway purchases have convinced me Dell is now the way to go. And I hear nothing but negative comments from other Gateway customers as well.
posted by bgluckman at 10:17 AM on March 5, 2001

I tried to get a part-time gig at a Gateway store as a PC tech last month. I went in for an interview and it seemed pretty promising. I never heard back from anyone and I guess this is the reason why. Oh well...
posted by armando at 10:19 AM on March 5, 2001

Holy Cow! Are they nuts?
posted by darren at 11:34 AM on March 5, 2001

"That statement floored a number of analysts, who said Gateway literally made a U-turn by abandoning a path that accounted for 100 percent of its fourth-quarter earnings."

Literally. The company actually pulled the steering wheel hard right and literally made a U-turn.

Does anyone know what literally means?
posted by jragon at 5:46 PM on March 5, 2001

u-turn n. complete reversal of direction of travel

You don’t have to be in a vehicle to make a u-turn. It’s a stretch, but I think it works.
posted by gleemax at 6:36 PM on March 5, 2001

If they did go out of business, it'd be good riddance to bad rubbish.

Wow ... I'm on my second Gateway desktop (bought one three years ago and the other late last year) and I've always been impressed with the company. I've never gotten anything but great products and great service.
posted by shauna at 6:38 PM on March 5, 2001

You don’t have to be in a vehicle to make a u-turn.

Yes, but you do have to be in a vehicle to literally make a U-turn.
posted by kindall at 7:54 PM on March 5, 2001

“Yes, but you do have to be in a vehicle to literally make a U-turn.”

I think it’s useless nitpicking. However, neither of Dictionary.com’s definitions require you to be in a vehicle to perform a u-turn. A company can be travelling in a certain direction & completely reverse that direction, no? That’s the literal (word for word) meaning of u-turn, no steering wheel needed.
posted by gleemax at 1:38 AM on March 6, 2001

Some of these threads that quickly go off topic remind me of word chain puzzles (the type that require you to connect two words by a series of steps in which you change one letter at a time). If they didn't literally make a u-turn, what's an example of a non-literal u-turn?
posted by gluechunk at 2:13 AM on March 6, 2001

A non-literal U-turn would be taking your company in an entirely different direction. Like this.
It would only be literal if the company was somehow moving across the landscape, and then spun around and headed back.
posted by sonofsamiam at 10:47 AM on March 6, 2001

I think it’s useless nitpicking.

Compare and contrast: "I'm gonna send you to the moon, Alice!" vs. "I'm gonna literally send you to the moon, Alice!"
posted by kindall at 12:10 PM on March 6, 2001

sonof, travel can mean more than just moving across a physical landscape. it's something moving in a direction, i.e. moving towards certain business objectives. thus, can't one do a literal u-turn?
posted by gluechunk at 12:29 PM on March 6, 2001

Yes, it can mean that, but it does not literally, (i.e. in actuality) mean that. If it is used in the context you describe, that would be a figurative use of the word.
posted by sonofsamiam at 12:37 PM on March 6, 2001

Could someone please explain to me the point of correcting grammar and spelling on discussion boards? All it does is shut down the conversation, and frankly, it's getting bloody annoying.
posted by frykitty at 1:05 PM on March 6, 2001

I don't think we're necessarily yelling at each other about grammar. We're exploring a phrase and its usage, which is interesting to do. Maybe we like william safire too much.

But yeah, it can get annoying. I think if this sort of stuff popped up in every thread then it would be bad. But it's confined to this thread which wasn't getting many posts in the first place.
posted by gluechunk at 1:21 PM on March 6, 2001

Honestly, I've been seeing this kind of distraction all over MeFi lately--it just happens to have taken over the thread here.
posted by frykitty at 1:23 PM on March 6, 2001

Compare and contrast: “I’m gonna send you to the moon, Alice!” vs. “I’m gonna literally send you to the moon, Alice!”

Don’t patronize me. If the article said “Gateway literally made a U-turn on the highway of life,” then you’d have reason to be upset.

A literal u-turn, using the word for word definition, does not include any specific method of travel. Time can travel; so can a car.

And, by the by, compare and contrast is redundant. When you compare two things you note their similarities and differences.

I’m tired of all this bickering. Why can’t you just admit that I’m right? :)
posted by gleemax at 1:39 PM on March 6, 2001

Let me be the first to say oops. Oops.
posted by gleemax at 1:40 PM on March 6, 2001

The dictionary lists all common usages of words, both figurative and literal, so it's not much of a guide to a word's literal meaning.

"U-turn" is derived from automobile travel. Any use that doesn't involve physically turning around is arugably figurative. Certainly any use that abstracts the term to time must be considered so! The notion of time moving in some sense (or ourselves moving through time) is itself highly figurative, as we don't literally move when time passes, and time is not a physical thing and thus cannot itself literally move.

In the example at hand, I'd say the application of "u-turn" has been abstracted even further, since Gateway has not actually changed its direction of travel through time. Gateway is executing a u-turn in some kind of conceptual, n-dimensional "business strategy space," and that seems extremely non-literal to me.

I think it would be a shame to lose "literally" to those who would like it to be a synonym for "really" or some other content-free adverbial intensifier.
posted by kindall at 2:25 PM on March 6, 2001

..
posted by chaz at 6:02 PM on March 6, 2001

I agree with Chaz.

kindall, you just have to make sure to say "literally literally." Like "Gateway literally, I mean literally literally, made a u-turn." This little tactic is becoming more and more common in English: "I love him, I mean, I don't love love him but I love him, y'know?"

(Topic? What topic?)
posted by rodii at 7:08 PM on March 6, 2001

Bah humbug. And I mean that literally.
posted by gleemax at 7:46 PM on March 6, 2001

I imagine you mean it more literarily. ;)

(Sorry, I really like words and am fascinated by their use. Didn't mean to run anything into the ground here and wouldn't have bothered if anyone was actually commenting on Gateway.)
posted by kindall at 9:52 PM on March 6, 2001

I, like apparently many others, don't have much to add to the conversation, except that I got the impression from the quote that it wasn't the journalist who said "literally" but the analyst.

So um, the people who are arguing about poor journalism um, shouldn't be.

Anyway, I'm mostly just throwing text atop an attempt to close the blockquote, 'cause, well, it's messing with my head.
posted by cCranium at 5:58 AM on March 7, 2001

Huh. Well, that sure as piss didn't work. Matt?
posted by cCranium at 5:59 AM on March 7, 2001