Andy Rooney
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The Conniving Roots of Shill
The action at the heart of the verb shill—promoting someone or something for pay—is not, on its face, unseemly. After all, that is what marketers and public relations firms do. But when someone is said to be shilling for something or someone there is a distinct note of disapproval, and often the implication that the act is somehow corrupt or dishonest, or that the product or person being promoted is not to be trusted. This connotation is actually the word’s birthright: in the early 1900s, the noun shill referred to a type of con artist, specifically one who aided others in their efforts to part people from their money. For example, a shill might be paid to fake a big win at a casino to make a game look easily winnable. The first uses of the verb shill, appearing around the same time as the noun, show it applying to the kinds of cons shills did, but the term eventually came to be used in cases when someone was simply promoting someone or something. Perhaps fitting for a word with a criminal past, shill has a mysterious origin: it’s thought to be a shortened form of the older synonymous term shillaber, but the etymological trail goes cold there.
Examples of shill in a Sentence
Rustin Dodd, New York Times, 1 May 2025
The White House has responded with a series of stunts — a live presidential endorsement on the South Lawn, the commerce secretary shilling for Tesla stock on Fox News, the FBI threatening vandals with terrorism charges — that all smack of desperation.
—Allison Morrow, CNN, 25 Mar. 2025
Ryan Schwartz, TVLine, 9 Feb. 2025
The Athletic has become a bit of a shill for 115 FC, seemingly quite credulous in the face of the overwhelming evidence.. much of which comes from their own emails.
—Sam Lee, The Athletic, 20 Jan. 2025
See All Example Sentences for shill
Cite this Entry
“Shill.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/shill. Accessed 5 May. 2025.
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