Just discovered a new "zombie phrase" (which is a term I just made up to describe a phrase that once was useful, and is still in use but has lost its meaning).

Whenever someone plugs a book on a podcast they say "available wherever you buy books", which is tautological nonsense.

I think where it came from is back when Amazon convinced everyone to talk about them when advertising books. Then people realized what was going on and started advertising smaller independent sellers instead. But eventually people got tired of that, but the cadence had embedded itself in our minds, and now we full that slot with a meaningless non-advertisement.

I wonder if this will continue to morph over time into something completely unrecognizable, like other common phrases we use without understanding.