I’m wondering if it is frequent for you to hear "Michael Jackson" used as a superlative in random situations?
The first time I remember hearing/reading it was long ago in some article comparing audio compression formats… It read something like "MP3 is the Michael Jackson of them all, everyone knows about it." (Personally, I wouldn’t associate a lossy format to MJ but I’m not sure if FLAC already existed back then.)
I sometimes do use "Michael Jackson" as a superlative, and it may feel a bit weird in my mind: I just said "Michael Jackson", but I’m not talking about Michael at all, and I’m not on an MJ forum or such…
Two personal anecdotes about it:
So, do you sometimes/often use/hear "Michael Jackson" used as a superlative? Will you use it now?
The first time I remember hearing/reading it was long ago in some article comparing audio compression formats… It read something like "MP3 is the Michael Jackson of them all, everyone knows about it." (Personally, I wouldn’t associate a lossy format to MJ but I’m not sure if FLAC already existed back then.)
I sometimes do use "Michael Jackson" as a superlative, and it may feel a bit weird in my mind: I just said "Michael Jackson", but I’m not talking about Michael at all, and I’m not on an MJ forum or such…
Two personal anecdotes about it:
- I once used it referring to a guy who had performed some kind of Prince tribute… or something like that, this memory is vague but I used it in a context that related to Prince… which I found amusing…
- I have some (non-professional) activities that involve artists. I’m in a strict background role which involves some creativity nonetheless. And talking about the performers there, there are a few guys in the world who I can say "He’s like the Michael Jackson of that." And, once, I was talking with someone else in that "community" and they said to me "You are like the name-of-one-of-those—few-guys at what you are doing here." For a brief moment it felt good to be indirectly compared to MJ… Not literally deserved I think… but not taken too seriously…
So, do you sometimes/often use/hear "Michael Jackson" used as a superlative? Will you use it now?