Login Is Not a Verb

We do not signup, login or checkout when we buy products online. We do not startup, shutdown or backup our computers. The reason: these words, primarily used in computing contexts, are not verbs.

These are just some of the “bad bad verbs” featured on a site dedicated to “informing people about words that are not verbs, even though people misuse them that way”. From what I can gather, this all started with loginisnotaverb.com:

Despite what many people — mostly in the computer field — think, “login” is not a verb. It’s simply not. Whether or not “login” is a word at all may spark a debate in some circles, but assuming it is then it may act as many parts of speech, but not as a verb.

And so it goes with all of these non-verbs:

• backup
• carryout
• checkout
• cutover
• cutoff
• failover
• login
• logoff
• logon
• logout
• lockdown
• pickup
• setup
• shutdown
• shutoff
• signin
• signoff
• signout
• signup
• startup

Of course, there’s the MeFi and HN threads to accompany your reading.