It's not a buzz word at all. Responsive design is popular for a reason.

The constantly
rising popularity of smart devices (tablets, phones etc.) has created a very serious
demand for websites that are viewable on small displays.

The premise for responsive design is that there are new mobile screen sizes (on tablets
and phones) extremely often, and it's impossible to redirect every mobile device to a
dedicated mobile website whose layout fits the screen of the device well. As a result,
new CSS standards and interface creation techniques have emerged to make website
layouts adaptive to the size of whatever viewport is currently viewing it.

If you want a live example, adjust the width of your browser screen on that website
(best on large monitors), and you'll see why the website is "responsive" to mobile
screens.

It describes a group of techniques, when used together, allow a page to change how it
is rendered based on the width of the client's browser width. The benefit is that your
site becomes somewhat "future-proofed" to render appropriately for any device. The
idea is that you create one design that adapts to any device, rather than creating
multiple designs for the different devices.

You can say: Apps and “mobile versions!!!”. Well, in the past, you might have
thought about creating an app for your website — say an iPad app or an Android app.
Or you would have a mobile version specifically for your website.
But with so many different devices today, it’s getting harder to create apps and versions
for every device and operating platform. As Smashing Magazine wrote, “When will the
madness stop? It won’t, of course.”  A responsive design that is flexible enough to be
viewed on multiple devices just makes sense.

More people are using mobile devices. A recent Pew study found that 45% of American
adults own a smartphone, and 31% own a tablet computer. As we reported yesterday,
smartphone shipments outpace those of regular mobile phones, and tablet growth is
surging.
You, actually, do not have to study these entire statistics. Just check your traffic and you
might just be shocked at how many visitors are getting to your website through many
DIFFERENT mobile and other devices.  Google Analytics allows you to do it easily:
select “Audience” on the left side and see all those traffic proportions. You can even drill
down to see which devices are sending the traffic.

Responsive design is affordable today. Don’t ignore it, don’t ignore your visitors who,
potentially might be your consumers or clients.