How about we stop calling them cigarettes...

[Unperson]

Everyone here knows the term "Electronic Cigarette" and it's derivatives, "E-Cigarette" and "E-Cig," but should we really be clinging to them? I know that using cigarette in the name is what helps others find these products. However, keeping this link to analog tobacco seems very counterproductive.

One of the most widely accepted alternatives is "Personal Vaporizer" (or PV) which is a very good descriptive. True, consumers searching for products will trip over traditional vaporizers in their efforts, but with greater use, "Personal Vaporizer" will dominate.

Another term used is "Nicotine Inhaler" (which is accurate) but that phrase still contains the "N" word that sends so many anti-smoking lobbyists into convulsions, speaking in tongues, and arming themselves with pitchforks and torches. Additionally, while the majority use nicotine, not all people use liquid with it in it. I think PV is the best option.

Also, many stopped using terms like "smoking" and using "vaping" instead. I think we all need to adhere to that. After all, we aren't smoking since nothing is being combusted. We need to break a association with analog tobacco and distance ourselves as much as possible.

The biggest bulls-eye? These forums are called "e-cigarette-forum". I realize that ball is already in motion so I don't think anything can be done there.

Still, with all the heat we're all experiencing, maybe one of the best things we can do to aid our own cause is be careful how we talk about it between ourselves and the rest of the world.

Thoughts?

 

[Moonflame]

I try to always call mine a PV (personal vaporizer) when I refer to it IRL, tho on the forums I do refer to it as an e-cig sometimes.

 

[smi1ey73]

I've been vaping for a month and I am still so confused I don't know what to call it. I am just glad I quit smoking

 

[jaded]

I go with nicotine inhaler or some times menthol inhaler because it sounds medical like the Nicorette inhaler. People tend to not interfere with your uses of what sounds like a medical device. I like PV too, but I wouldn't uses a vaporizer(tobacco) like the iolite in public. Plus vaporizer is more linked with another smoking activity.

 

[ChipCurtis]

This has been discussed ad nauseum for months in other threads on this forum. Evidence points to the fact that, when they finally started making them to look like analogs and marketed them as e-cigs, sales took off because they were reaching the intended audience. The cost to that increased sales and popularity is, of course, the association with analogs.

The other reason for the e-cig label and desire to be categorized as a tobacco product is for legal loophole reasons -- to keep the e-cig legal until we can find a better classification for it ("reduced harm"). Using the term PV and admitting there is nicotine in the liquid without classifying as a tobacco product means only one thing: Unauthorized Drug Delivery Device, Big Pharma takes over, and the device is banned pending 10 years of studies.

Which outcome do you prefer?

 

[rtbob]

How bout we call'em ...? (Life Saving Device)

 

[Mammal]

The thing that gets me about 'PV'/'vaporizer'/'vaping' is that 'vaporizers' have been around longer in relation to that other smoked plant (Edit: as jaded already noted above!). I'm sure it'll all settle out eventually - and it's an accurate description of function of two otherwise-unrelated devices - but until then I'm really "anti-" the hassle of taking anything labeled VAPORIZER past courthouse security as my job sometimes requires.* Especially when those people are very used to seeing people forget that they'll have to empty their pockets, and are tasked with scrutinizing electronics closely...

Meanwhile, I've been rolling with someone else's use of 'smorking' and as awful as that is - how seriously do we want to be taken? Real smoke, or medicinal vapor attracts the 'health police' that everyone's so worried about, but 'fake smoke' sounds like a goofy-uncle novelty as long as you're not being a jerk with it. (Now, does the theater crowd have some 'legitimate' silly word for the use of these on stage?)

---
*I'm sure 99% of them would be fine with it, but with my luck I'll get complacent and be in a hurry when I run into the one who doesn't believe it and needs to call everyone over to look. Which would be awkward enough without my anxiety problems.

 

[Unperson]

This has been discussed ad nauseum for months in other threads on this forum. Evidence points to the fact that, when they finally started making them to look like analogs and marketed them as e-cigs, sales took off because they were reaching the intended audience. The cost to that increased sales and popularity is, of course, the association with analogs.

Yes, I realize all that. While I will concede that making them resemble analogs aided in sales and (to an extent) assisted users in psychologically accepting them as substitutes, it also harmed us by creating the first half of our current woes by opening up the "they are tobacco products" argument.

What is done is done. They look like analogs (with the exception of some models such as the Joye Stick, the DSE905, and other products) but that doesn't mean we have to exacerbate the situation and continue to call them e-cigs when trying to educate others.

The other reason for the e-cig label and desire to be categorized as a tobacco product is for legal loophole reasons -- to keep the e-cig legal until we can find a better classification for it ("reduced harm"). Using the term PV and admitting there is nicotine in the liquid without classifying as a tobacco product means only one thing: Unauthorized Drug Delivery Device, Big Pharma takes over, and the device is banned pending 10 years of studies.

The term PV doesn't admit to nicotine content. Nicotine Inhaler does, which is why I didn't approve of that moniker. Also, just because Jeff Spicoli and his minions also have found a "tasty bud" use for vaporizers doesn't mean a PV is a drug tool. Still, I'm open to a different term other than PV if it will aid in dropping the "It's a drug" stigma.

Which outcome do you prefer?

Gee, that didn't sound too condescending, did it?

...

My point is, if calling them "e-cigs" puts us in the tobacco product camp and "PV" or "NI" relates them as drug product then maybe we need a different term.

 

[Oliver]

Unperson, in actual fact the tobacco association may well have been what kept e-cigs on the market. If you read judge Leon's ruling you will see that it is this that led him to overule the FDA's drug-device designation.

The fact is that it makes zero difference what e-cigs are called - it's their intended use that is key.

 

[Unperson]

Unperson, in actual fact the tobacco association may well have been what kept e-cigs on the market. If you read judge Leon's ruling you will see that it is this that led him to overule the FDA's drug-device designation.

The fact is that it makes zero difference what e-cigs are called - it's their intended use that is key.

True. I'm just trying to keep the witch-burners out of my backyard.

 

[ChipCurtis]

The fact is that it makes zero difference what e-cigs are called - it's their intended use that is key.

Exactly. Judge Leon explictly stated in his ruling that the FDA has no right to re-classify this device in opposition to the way the e-cig companies have stated what their intended use is, i.e. the way they are marketing them. He called it "bootstrapping run amok".

 

[rtbob]

My intended use for these thingies is to keep me off a ventilator drowning in my own snot.

 

[Unperson]

My intended use for these thingies is to keep me off a ventilator drowning in my own snot.

Bartender.. ..I'll have what he's having..

 

[underwater goddess]

How about "vapor sticks"?

 

[Thulium]

It would be a good idea to stop calling them cigarettes if Judge Leon had ruled against Smoking Everywhere. But since The Good Judge was smart enough to see past the desperate power plays of the FDA, we now have a precedent in law that "electronic cigarette" is a term for a tobacco product subject to appropriate regulation as such.

So...call it something else if you want to be able to sell it to children (drug devices can be sold to minors), but thanks to Judge Leon, e-cigarette is an appropriate name and we don't need to avoid it.

 

[martha1014]

We don't call them just plain cigarettes. We call them electronic cigarettes which I think is an appropriate name. They look and act like a cigarettes but they are electronic.

It's too late now to change the name.

What I don't understand why we call cigarettes analogs. Where did this come. This doesn't even make since to me. I just call them cigarettes.

 

[Thulium]

What I don't understand why we call cigarettes analogs. Where did this come. This doesn't even make since to me. I just call them cigarettes.

It is a tongue-in-cheek reference. We are using the new shiny "digital" and have eschewed the old school "analog". The transition period when you are first getting used to vaping could then be called an "analog to digital conversion", etc.

Funny story: The other day I was chatting online with a friend that I met way back before the internet was king on an oldskool chat BBS. I was on some sort of rant about e-cigs and used the term "analog". My friend said, "I think the fact that you just use the word 'analog' to refer to a cigarette has to be the nerdiest thing I've ever heard."

 

[underwater goddess]

Or, "vapor inhalers"!

 

[warlike36]

Nicotine inhaler here,whats an e-cig,lol. Seriously tho, it is a better term,less neg. attn.

 

[NCC]

I call mine PVs.