When did "unique" stop being an absolute?

[auld_hippie]

"This gizmo is sorta unique." "This foobaz is different than that one." I even hear these usages uttered by narrators on television! At least once on Discovery no less. Kids on IRC chatting as though they're posting from their cell phones and being charged per character. "C U L8R KTHXBAI" Sometimes no spaces at all. I was looking at ringtones

Comments

[cybermystic]

I get the feeling reading a current stylebook would probably raise your blood pressure.

[auld_hippie]

Those are now accepted usages?

[cybermystic]

The broader usage of 'unique' to mean unusual rather as an absolute superlative was actually around for a century in published writings before 1906 when the Fowler brothers decreed it should only be used in the absolute sense. The usage is proscribed in academic writing by and large but you're going to encounter it in stuff targeted to the mass audience.

If it helps it's extremely unlikely that I'd use unique in any other sense than the absolute. I might occasionally use the broader sense for humorous effect even though sadly most won't catch the joke.