It seemed somewhat plausible or serious to me because "ultimate" is slang for "really cool" in India. (At least it was when I was growing up; who knows what the cool kids there say these days.) But I was puzzled because I've spent the majority of my adult life in North America, and never heard "penultimate" used that way.
I was wrong. Apparently it is slang, in some places at least:
> The word penultimate as a slang word seems to have worked its way into common parlance thanks to the slang use of the word ultimate. As a slang term, ultimate means cool rather than last. So the hipster logic may have concluded that if ultimate means cool, then penultimate must mean super cool.
I think it's used in marketing sometimes because it sounds cool, so you'll assume it means something good if you don't understand it. Doesn't come up a lot though.
It seemed somewhat plausible or serious to me because "ultimate" is slang for "really cool" in India. (At least it was when I was growing up; who knows what the cool kids there say these days.) But I was puzzled because I've spent the majority of my adult life in North America, and never heard "penultimate" used that way.