PowerPoints?

My web stats showed a spike in activity today. A little research, and I found out that I'm in position number three at ask.com for the term "PowerPoints".

How strange, I thought. Did I misspell the word "PowerPoint" on that page? I went into my site. Nope, I spelled it right.

In fact, other than this blog posting, nowhere on this site do I use the term "PowerPoints." Not that I'm a grammarian or anything, but I'm pretty sure that you don't pluralize software names.

If I want to pluralize, I can say "PowerPoint presentations" or "PowerPoint templates" or "PowerPoint backgrounds" or "PowerPoint files" or whatnot. I don't say "PowerPoints", inasmuch as I wouldn't say, "I have two Words, three Excels, etc."

Rather, I'd say, "I have two Word documents and three Excel Spreadsheets." Or just plain Word files or Excel files....you get the drift.

So now I'm wondering about two things:

1. Since quite a few people search for "PowerPoints"...am I wrong? Should I refer to PowerPoint presentations as just "PowerPoints?" Is this the new slang, hip thing?
2. And since I haven't used the phrase up 'til now, why would the Butler at Ask.com decide that my site was the go-to site for that term?

Thanks, Jeeves!

¶ 11/01/2005 04:09:00 PM