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  • Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Verb Phrase 112. The verb phrase today is

  • rip off. All right. We actually have three meanings and we're going to give

  • three examples to rip-off. It is very, very common. We use it for a lot of things.

  • Let's look at the first one usually just means to steal. We could say somebody

  • ripped somebody off. It means somebody stole something from somebody or to cheat or

  • swindle. You know kind of a similar meaning but yet a little different. We

  • could say somebody ripped somebody off by cheating them. They may not have

  • literally stole something from them but they they deceived them or cheated

  • them in some way. Number three to plagiarize shamelessly either like copy

  • somebody's work or take their work and use your own name for it.

  • Shamelessly copy. Yeah. To plagiarize or shamelessly copy something from someone.

  • So we might say somebody ripped off somebody else's work in that sort of

  • sense. All right. Let's look at an example number one. That shoplifter...

  • remember a shoplifter that is somebody who usually steals things from stores. That

  • shoplifter ripped off that vendor. You know maybe a street vendor of selling

  • something. He took some items while the vendor was distracted. So he ripped

  • him off. In this case, this directly means steal. He stole some items from that

  • street vendor maybe. Good let's look at number two. In 2016 Wells Fargo admitted

  • to ripping off its customers by opening thousands of unauthorized accounts for

  • customers and then charging them for fees on these accounts. So this is

  • definitely cheating or swindling. So unauthorized means they never... these

  • people never asked for these accounts to be open. Maybe they had another account

  • with them but they opened them like a second or a third account and then they

  • just pretended like they opened that account because they had all their

  • information from the first account. And they just opened it for them and then

  • suddenly they contact them. Well you know you know you got to pay a lot of late

  • fees here. You got a lot of these fees and people like what huh what ?

  • Do I have another account ? Why I didn't open that one. Well where'd that come

  • from ? So a lot of people got nervous and just

  • paid it. But other people were like... Wait what's going on ? And of course it got discovered

  • that they they really did do that into thousands of them. So that would be an

  • example of really cheating and swindling. mm-hmm . Okay.

  • and that number three. That composer accused that rapper of ripping off his

  • music. Yeah. We hear this all the time in the music world. You know someone you

  • might get a big hit, and somebody else saying hey you, you that's really ... You

  • stole my music basically You know, Sometimes they win. Sometimes they're not

  • sometimes it's closed sometimes it's not. But but yes we could use it that way

  • meaning like plagiarize and steal and in that sense. Okay anyway, I hope you got it.

  • Oh it's clear. Thank you for your time. Bye-bye.

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Verb Phrase 112. The verb phrase today is

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