glitch

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English

Etymology

Probably from Yiddish גליטש (glitsh), from German glitschig (“slippy”), from glitsch (“slide, glide, slip”) + -ig (“-y”). Related to gleiten (“glide”). Cognate with French glisser (“to slip, to slide, to skid”).

Popularized 1960s, by US space program. Attested 1962 by American astronaut John Glenn, in reference to spikes in electrical current.[1]

Pronunciation

Noun

glitch (plural glitches)

  1. A problem affecting function.
    Synonyms: bug, hitch, imperfection, quirk
    • 1965, Time magazine:
      Glitches—a spaceman’s word for irritating disturbances.
    • 1999, The Wachowski Brothers, The Matrix (motion picture), spoken by Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss):
      A déjà vu is usually a glitch in the Matrix. It happens when they change something.
    They are still trying to work out all the glitches.
  2. (video games) A bug or an exploit.
    Performing this glitch gives you extra lives.
  3. (music) A genre of experimental electronic music since the 1990s, characterized by a deliberate use of sonic artifacts that would normally be viewed as unwanted noise.
    Hypernym: electronic music
    Hyponym: glitchcore
    Coordinate term: noise
    • 2011, Simon Reynolds, Bring the Noise: 20 Years of Writing About Hip Rock and Hip Hop, Soft Skull Press (→ISBN), page 313:
      You can hear this in the contemporary genre of ‘glitch’, where artists like Oval and Fennesz make radically beautiful music using the snaps, crackles and pops emitted by damaged CDs, malfunctioning software, etc.
  4. (informal, engineering) An unexpected behavior in an electrical signal, especially if the signal spontaneously returns to expected behavior after a period of time.
    Coordinate terms: surge, spike, instability
    • 1962, John Glenn, Into Orbit, London: Cassell:
      Another term we adopted to describe some of our problems was "glitch." Literally, a glitch is a spike or change in voltage in an electrical circuit which takes place when the circuit suddenly has a new load put on it. You have probably noticed a dimming of lights in your home when you turn a switch or start the dryer or the television set.

Derived terms

Translations

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Translations to be checked

Verb

Lua error in Module:en-headword at line 1136: Legacy parameter 1=es/ies/d no longer supported, just use 'en-verb' without params

  1. To experience an intermittent, unexpected, malfunction.
    My computer keeps glitching; every couple of hours it just reboots without warning.
  2. (video games) To perform an exploit or recreate a bug while playing a video game.
    His character will glitch into the wall and out of the level.

Further reading

References

  1. ^ Moradi, Iman. (2004) Glitch Aesthetic
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