Those copywriters know exactly what they’re doing, and “2x" is far better sounding than “half”, because “2x” is more, and more is always good. This is of course the profession that hides its lies with sentence fragments and misleading wording. One I remember, from Apple, of course, was “Every day, more photos are taken on iPhone”. No, there was no “than” except the one they wanted you to imagine. Really, It just said that people take photos. Replace with “box Brownie” and it’s equally true. An unsupportable claim is illegal, but something that sounds almost like the same unsupportable claim? That’s advertising!
But the one unnecessary insertion that really bugs me is politicians and other spokesbeings who use the formulation “...who, sadly, died” . As there’s no occasion to ever say “who, happily, died” in public, then the word “sadly” is redundant here. Death isn’t sad - it’s heart-breaking. Grief deserves respect, and their insulting platitudes diminish that into a phony soundbite. The only thing worse is when the speaker bulldozes through the commas before and after “sadly” (it is a sub-clause), leaving us with: “he sadly died”. Was he really sad? Was he more likely surprised? Did someone in theatre wake him from anaesthesia to ask how he felt just before he popped off? Stop it. Stop it now!