vaguebook

English

Etymology

Blend of vague +‎ Facebook

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈveɪɡˌbʊk/

Verb

vaguebook (third-person singular simple present vaguebooks, present participle vaguebooking, simple past and past participle vaguebooked)

1. (Internet slang, intransitive) To post deliberately cryptic statements on social media (particularly Facebook) so as to elicit attention or requests for detail.

   Hypernym: vagueblog

   Coordinate term: subtweet

   • 2016 March 8, Jen Chaney, “‘House of Cards’ Season 4, Episode 7: Rock Star Candidate”, in New York Times‎^[1]:

     While watching that video of the 2012 New Year’s Eve party, both the president and first lady realize they have something to hold over their rival’s head. What it is, exactly, remains unclear. Which is maddening; these two talk to each other the way some people “vaguebook” on Facebook.

   • 2017 July 6, Deb Amlen, “Intentionally Mysterious Update”, in New York Times‎^[2]:

     There. You’ve just had a taste of VAGUEBOOKing, a fabulous word that has been around for a while, but which makes its New York Times Crossword debut today as VAGUEBOOKS. If you have an active Facebook account, you undoubtedly have at least one friend who tends to do this.

   • 2019, Gretchen McCulloch, chapter 6, in Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language, Riverhead Books, →ISBN:

     A less subtle way of navigating the relationship between the public and the obscure is found in subtweeting or vaguebooking (vague facebooking), the art of posting elliptically about a social situation without naming names.