"Unfriend" Word of Year 2009

Do you have a social networking website account? Facebook? Multiply? This year, the social networking has proven that it has a huge cultural force.

"Unfriend" has been named the word of the year by the New Oxford American Dictionary, chosen from a list of finalists with a tech-savvy bent.

Unfriend was defined as a verb that means to remove someone as a "friend" on a social networking side such as Facebook.

"It has both currency and potential longevity," said Christine Lindberg, senior lexicographer for Oxford's U.S. dictionary program, in a statement.

"In the online social networking context, its meaning is understood, so its adoption as a modern verb form makes this an interesting choice for Word of the Year." (Source: Reuters)

unfriend – verb – To remove someone as a 'friend' on a social networking site such as Facebook.

Example, "I decided to unfriend my roommate on Facebook after we had a fight."

Each year Oxford University Press tracks how the English language is changing and chooses a word that best reflects the mood of the year.

Oxford lexicographer Christine Lindberg says unfriend has "real lex appeal."

Finalists for 2009 also included netbook, which is a small laptop, and sexting, which is sending sexually explicit texts and pictures by cell phone.

This announcement will surely be applauded by Facebook, Myspace and other social networking users.

I am not a wordsmith nor a lexicon or scrabble expert; after you have read this post, I'll appreciate if you could enlighten me on the words defriend and refriend? Now I am more confused, the important thing is that you are my friend.