scattershot

English

Etymology

From scatter +‎ shot.

Pronunciation

  • Audio (US):(file)

Adjective

scattershot (comparative more scattershot, superlative most scattershot)

  1. Covering a broad range in a random and unsystematic way.
    Synonym: scattergun
    • 2007, Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes, Penguin, published 2008, page 4:
      They were appalled by his idea of making a spy service out of a scattershot collection of Wall Street brokers, Ivy League eggheads, soldiers of fortune, ad men, news men, stunt men, second-story men, and con men.
    • 2013 September 10, Michiko Kakutani, “A Calamity Tailor-Made for Internet Conspiracy Theories”, in The New York Times‎[1]:
      The result, disappointingly, is a scattershot work that is, by turns, entertaining and wearisome, energetic and hokey, delightfully evocative and cheaply sensational; dead-on in its conjuring of zeitgeist-y atmospherics, but often slow-footed and ham-handed in its orchestration of social details.
    • 2021, Critics Consensus, Don't Look Up‎[2]:
      Don't Look Up aims too high for its scattershot barbs to consistently land, but Adam McKay's star-studded satire hits its target of collective denial square on.
    • 2023 May 8, Nilay Patel, “What happens when Google Search doesn’t have the answers?”, in The Verge‎[3], Vox Media:
      Oh, and then there’s the hardest challenge of all: Google, famously scattershot in its product launches and quick to abandon things, has to stay focused on a new product and actually develop a meaningful replacement to search without killing it in a year and starting over.

See also

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