Словарь OED уточнил значение термина «softball question» и обновил статистику его употребления

Revised 2016 softball question noun Factsheet What does the noun softball question mean? There is one meaning in OED's entry for the noun softball question. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence. This word is used in North American English. How common is the noun softball question? Fewer than 0.01 occurrences per million words in modern written English 2017 | 0.043 2018 | 0.048 2019 | 0.047 2020 | 0.049 2021 | 0.046 2022 | 0.048 2023 | 0.043 2024 | 0.043 2025 | 0.044 What is the earliest known use of the noun softball question? Earliest known use 1970s The earliest known use of the noun softball question is in the 1970s. OED's earliest evidence for softball question is from 1970, in Newsday (New York). Nearby entries soft, adj. Old English– soft, v. a1225– soft, adv. Old English– softa, n. 1603– softback, n. & adj. 1832– soft-backed, adj. 1803– softball, n. 1867– softball, v. 1927– soft-balled, adj. 1916– softballer, n. 1926– softball question, n. 1970– softball throw, n. 1930– soft belly, n. 1942– softbill, adj. & n. 1829– soft-billed, adj. a1705– softboard, n. 1856– soft-board, v. 1878–1922 soft-bodied, adj. 1782– soft-boil, v. 1832– soft-boiled, adj. 1577– soft box, n. 1979– Browse more nearby entries Meaning & use Originally and chiefly North American. 1970– A question that is easy to answer; an unchallenging question. 1970 Two other gripes of the newsmen—the ‘softball’ question usually tossed by newsmen trying to curry favor with the President, and the lack of opportunity to follow up on questions. Newsday (New York) 16 December (Nassau edition) ii. 13 a /2 1996 Shriver lobbed one softball question after another at Mrs. Clinton. New Yorker 21 October 177/3 2006 When the camera started rolling, Senor moderated the conversation, asking Bremer one softball question after another. , Imperial Life in Emerald City (2007) vii. 149 softball question 1970– A question that is easy to answer; an unchallenging question. lob ball 1982– Chiefly Canadian and in political contexts. A question that is easy to answer, esp. one that is asked in order to make the respondent look… Frequency softball question typically occurs fewer than 0.01 times per million words in modern written English. Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate. Frequency of softball question, n., 1970–2010 * Occurrences per million words in written English Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010. The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations. For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies. Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus. Decade | Frequency per million words 1970 | 0.003 1980 | 0.004 1990 | 0.004 2000 | 0.004 2010 | 0.005 Frequency of softball question, n., 2017–2025 * Occurrences per million words in written English Modern frequency series are derived from a corpus of 20 billion words, covering the period from 2017 to the present. The corpus is mainly compiled from online news sources, and covers all major varieties of World English. Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the corpus. Period | Frequency per million words 2017 | 0.043 2018 | 0.048 2019 | 0.047 2020 | 0.049 2021 | 0.046 2022 | 0.048 2023 | 0.043 2024 | 0.043 2025 | 0.044