Stunning phrases

If a company told you it made "electronic control devices", you'd probably think it specialised in thermostats or the computers that manage a car's fuel injection system. In fact, this description is so anodyne that when one company used it, I wondered whether I was looking at the right company. A provider of "electronic control devices for use in the law enforcement, military, private security and personal defence markets" in the boilerplate of a statement narrows it down a bit. Yet the name of the company, which is fighting delisting from Nasdaq for not filing its third-quarter 10Q on time, gives the game away immediately: Taser. I wonder how long it took the publicity people to dream up "electronic control" as an alternative to "stun gun".