Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Existence or apparent existence everywhere at the same time; omnipresence.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Omnipresence, or a capacity of being in an indefinite number of places at the same time, not strictly amounting to omnipresence: as, the ubiquity of Christ's body; the ubiquity of the king (see below).
  • noun The doctrines or beliefs of the Ubiquitarians.
  • noun Locality; neighborhood; whereabouts.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Existence everywhere, or in all places, at the same time; omnipresence.
  • noun (Theol.) The doctrine, as formulated by Luther, that Christ's glorified body is omnipresent.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun uncountable The state or quality of being, or appearing to be, everywhere at once; actual or perceived omnipresence.
  • noun countable, sciences Anything that is found to be ubiquitous within a specified area

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the state of being everywhere at once (or seeming to be everywhere at once)

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[New Latin ubīquitās, from Latin ubīque, everywhere : ubī, where; see kwo- in Indo-European roots + -que, and, generalizing particle; see kwe in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle French ubiquité, from Latin ubique.

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Examples

  • This has been tried before and failed, but maybe the technology and connectivity ubiquity is finally good enough to make it reality.

    Google's Microsoft Moment - Anil Dash 2009

  • Both are characterized by their ubiquity and their antiquity: No known human culture lacks them, and musical instruments are among the oldest human artifacts, dating to the Late Pleistocene about 50,000 years ago.

    A Sound Check For the Ages Daniel J. Levitin 2011

  • They offer their customers a certain ubiquity, along with a consistency of product.

    Do publishers matter? 2008

  • NEW YORK In an era when ad ubiquity is being met with more consumer avoidance, marketers are trying to make ads that work — literally.

    Ad Track: Winning ads really work for consumers 2008

  • Glass, for all its usefullness and ubiquity, is widely overlooked for its potential to enhance our lives in many ways and the building block bottle is just one of them … heineken should have considered using additional colors and expanded the kinds of building components that its packaging suggests.

    HEINEKEN WOBO: The brick that holds beer | Inhabitat 2007

  • BTW, Wi-Fi user configuration could also be simplified, as the syndication network provides a de-facto standard roaming config (SSIDs, etc), so the simplicity and ubiquity is maintained.

    Smart Mobs » Blog Archive » WiFi Business Model Fu 2003

  • Besides, as he was with the army of Virginia, and the South fought battles elsewhere, he, not having the gift of ubiquity, is forced to rely for events of which he was not an eye-witness upon letters from friends and announcements in newspapers.

    Current Literature 1863

  • Dresdensis) _ of 1571 the Philippists of Electoral Saxony also rejected the omnipresence (which they termed ubiquity) of the human nature of

    Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church 1894

  • Bank of China deftly leverages its "ubiquity" - i.e., "almost a branch on every corner" to reinforce "life-long partnership, through good times and bad."

    Tom Doctoroff: How Marketers Can Win During China's "Recession" 2009

  • Sacramentarians; it pronounced, as Calvin never would have done, that the unworthy communicant receives Our Lord's Body; and it met his objection by the strange device of "ubiquity" -- namely, that the glorified Christ was everywhere.

    The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 3: Brownson-Clairvaux 1840-1916 1913

Comments

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  • Why do people say ubiquitousness instead of ubiquity?

    Or is there a reason for the existence of "ubiquitousness"? Is that word denoting the quality of being ubiquitous, and this word (ubiquity), the actual being?

    October 17, 2007

  • No one ever said English was an organized language. ;-) It's the same reason I believe utilize should be stricken from the language. Forever.

    October 17, 2007

  • I have the same problem with humbleness. Can't people just say humility? It's a much nicer word.

    October 17, 2007

  • Sometimes it's just forgetfulness. In high school I got a paper back from a teacher with a big red circle around this word: angriness. It said "Anger?" in the margin. Now, that was just being dense (density?). But LOTs of people say "ubiquitousness," and say it frequently, as if ubiquity just didn't exist.

    And we all know ubiquity exists. Oh yes it does. It's everywhere. Ahuh! Huhhuh! < -- weak, upper-class-twit laugh.

    October 18, 2007

  • So uselessness could, in theory, be called uselessity. *stroking chin, thinking*

    October 18, 2007

  • Let's not forget about mexicocity...

    October 18, 2007

  • Ha!

    October 18, 2007

  • Why do people say hideousness when clearly hideosity is infinitely preferable?

    October 18, 2007

  • *feeling like everyone's picking on me*

    What about iniquitousness? Nobody says *that*. They say iniquity, as is just and pleasing in the eyes of the Lord.

    October 18, 2007

  • No no...we love you, c_b. We just know how easy it is to yank your chain.

    October 18, 2007

  • Skip, you've got to stop hanging around the uselessness.

    October 18, 2007

  • I agree with you, c_b. I just wanted to yank the uselessness' chain. ;->

    October 18, 2007

  • Here, let me take it off from around my neck, and you can yank it all you want. Go crazy.

    October 18, 2007

  • Never mind. You got me back with mexicocity.

    October 18, 2007

  • The quality of trying to be ubiquitous is not a quality one at all!

    July 4, 2009