Many of radio's most familiar shop words (cue, gag, ad lib) are hand-me-downs from its elder cousins, the stage and screen. But radio now fits so snugly into a few that they seem custom-made. Last week Mutual published a dictionary of 200-odd broadcasting terms. Sample radioese:
clinkera bad or sour musical note.
fluffmissing a cue, or stumbling over a gag.
hooka stunt, novelty, contest or other device intended to produce tangible evidence of audience attention.
lega regional chain, one link of stations in a network.
liveas opposed to recorded or transcribed.
mike hogone who elbows others away from a microphone.
on the button (head, nose)a program ending exactly...
