White Noise (slang)
The term white noise, the 'sh' noise produced by a signal containing all audible frequencies of vibration, is sometimes used as slang (or a neologism) to describe a meaningless commotion or chatter that masks or obliterates underlying information.
The information itself may have characteristics that achieve this effect without the need to introducing a masking layer. A common example of this usage is a politician including more information than needed to mask a point he doesn't want noticed.
In music the term is used for music that is discordant with no melody; disagreeable, harsh or dissonant.
Read more about White Noise (slang): "White Noise" in The Media
Famous quotes containing the words white and/or noise:
“Man is the end of nature; nothing so easily organizes itself in every part of the universe as he; no moss, no lichen is so easily born; and he takes along with him and puts out from himself the whole apparatus of society and condition extempore, as an army encamps in a desert, and where all was just now blowing sand, creates a white city in an hour, a government, a market, a place for feasting, for conversation, and for love.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)
“Places where he might live and die and never hear of the United States, which make such a noise in the world,never hear of America, so called from the name of a European gentleman.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)