Not to bash a ton of people at once..

[-Kunoke-]

Ok, so even though I'm not trying to, I know, and you all know, it will.

I'd just like to know...out of sheer wonderment,

WHY oh WHY do people refuse to actually type correctly? I see more and more adults (or claiming to be so) these days, typing like this.

(completely random example)
"ofmg lol i totally won and lik i owned u" <---That being an example of something someone would say in a game if they beat you.

Now I'm not sure about this but I don't think that's english...nope, not last time I checked. People who type like this know they are typing incorrectly and I'd just like to know why. Is it just because you're lazy? I really would like to know, I'm not TRYING to be mean about it... :weird: I fail to undestand. 😛

 

[Low_Roads]

I understand your point, Kunoke. But I find it hard to become particularly riled by it. We're only dealing with clubbish shorthand, the online equivelant of a Masonic handshake. I can't do it myself (never got the hang of using "lol", for example), but as long as a person's meaning is clear I won't argue the form in which he chooses to express himself. I really don't think standards are being compromised. This sort of contact seems bound peculiarly to the internet.

 

[Lummie]

Oh well, kinda depends on my mood xD. Sometimes it's pretty funny to write stuff like this(ok, not THAT extreme) 😛

 

[-Kunoke-]

I understand your point, Kunoke. But I find it hard to become particularly riled by it. We're only dealing with clubish shorthand, the online equivelant of a Masonic handshake. I can't do it myself (never got the hang of using "lol", for example), but as long as a person's meaning is clear I won't argue the form in which he chooses to express himself. I really don't think standards are being compromised. This sort of contact seems bound peculiarly to the internet.

Well the only time it really bothers me is if it's completely impossible to understand. I'm just finding it difficult trying to figure out why some people choose to type like that.

 

[maddhatter1]

well..

(completely random example)
"ofmg lol i totally won and lik i owned u" <---That being an example of something someone would say in a game if they beat you.

i on the other hand become extremely riled about the word "own" or as the illiterates continue to say "pwn" (if you've played americas army then you have seen this one). Its an annoyance if nothing else and call me petty but it does annoy me its the single most stupid (word?) on the internet. as for "lik" simple typo and "lol" "omfg" is nothing more than a time saver. Makes me wonder if these people who use these words talk like that on the phone or to their families.

 

[-Kunoke-]

i on the other hand become extremely riled about the word "own" or as the illiterates continue to say "pwn" (if you've played americas army then you have seen this one). Its an annoyance if nothing else and call me petty but it does annoy me its the single most stupid (word?) on the internet. as for "lik" simple typo and "lol" "omfg" is nothing more than a time saver. Makes me wonder if these people who use these words talk like that on the phone or to their families.

As I am familiar with the words "pwn" and "own", I can tell you that they actually have meaning, and actually are 2 different things all together while some people say they are the same. To pwn means, for instance, in America's army, to walk up into someone's face and shoot them in the head from like 5 feet away. To own means to kill someone before they knew it was coming or to kill them without getting hit once OR to get up in their face, run around while they shoot at you, and end up killing them anyway. Own just means so many different things that it seems to be a little more popular. I know it is on Halo 2. As for lik being a typo, while I see the reasoning, it's usually more than a simple typo. I see people say lik, then every time they try to say like, they say lik again, never getting it right. Then I point it out to them and they claim that lik is correct. :weird:

"lol" and "omfg" don't bug me much either, but I prefer just to say oh my fucking god when I'm trying to say oh my fucking god, ya know? 🙂

 

[coloman]

I don't like it either Kunoke but I do use lol or RU from time to time when I am online and want to save a little time. I think the main reason people use shortened words is because in everyday life no matter if it's at work, at the store or even at home most people are in a big hurry to do whatever it is they are doing. That is especially true when you are online because a lot of people you chat with are in a hurry even when they are using their computer. To put it in a nutshell I think most people are in too big of a hurry to do everything and that even includes typing.

 

[mart]

There is one problem with this question, and that is that you are never going to address the main offenders. They either won't read it, or if they happened to, would certainly not reply and let the cat out of the bag, so to speak.

No one is going to say:- Yeah I'm the illiterate, slovenly, idle slob who has hardly bothered to learn to write, let alone spell. And anyway, I'm far too macho and sure of myself to admit that my brain got rubbed to a frazzle by my mother's pelvic bones at birth.

So a few of us belonging to a kind of intellectual Tickletheater elite (wow, do I really belong here) are going to get a bit hot under the collar when confronted with this kind of crap - and then do what so few do, namely READ THROUGH THE BLOODY POST BEFORE WE PUSH THE BUTTON.

 

[shark]

Hukt on fonix wurkt fur me.


(I had to do it.....)

 

[AphxA1]

I hear that alot in halo, or playing an online game such as everquest or ffonline. People use to use omg I pawned the mob or I owned it. Its just some modern form of trash talk. Also, it has alot to do with people lazy. Instead of typing hi or how are you doing they type sup or place in some emoticon.

omg-oh my god
omfg-oh my f-in god
lol-laugh out loud
xD or ^^-japanese emoticons

People who talk like this think they are leet or something like that. However, to people are who not into online gaming, or anime, you may sound like an idiot.

 

[cinnabar]

Web logs are terrible about this sort of thing. I remember seeing it just getting started around 95 back in the heyday of IRC. (efnet, undernet, dalnet, etc)

 

[Ignatz]

I'm old enough to remember when correcting your own typing and spelling mistakes was actually a lot of work. Anyone here ever used a manual typewriter? Now you can do it with a few keystrokes and people still won't take the trouble! The reasons are many, as you've all suggested. Some are ignorant, some are lazy, some are simply stoned or drunk when they post. Most have been betrayed by their educators and never compelled to learn the proper way to express themselves. Others have imbibed from the Cult of the Common Man the notion that sincerity is all that matters in communication; rules of usage, grammar, syntax and spelling are "elitist." A very few know better but puckishly defy the rules for effect, much as the avant-garde poets of the early 20th century did. And Eric is right...none of them has read this far in the thread, except maybe those in the last group.
Of course, there is another group, those for whom English is not their native language and who, in most cases, seem to be doing the best they can. Power to them and I hope they continue to improve.
The problem of jargon, slang and acronyms is, of course, endemic to any new field of endeavor or form of communication. I never did master the silly lingo the truck drivers came up with in the 1970's for use on their CB radios!

 

[Timewarp]

I say it's just simply faster and get's the point across. In our fast pace world we live in, we can't be slow and must do everything fast. That's just modernization for ya.

 

[Dude'sonfire]

I have to agree with timewarp. You're all sounding a tad FCC esque with this 'type how we say you should' attitude, I mean let people talk how they want, lol for Yoda's sake if no one elses 😛

 

[nessonite1]

When I first started going online I was 13 and at that time, at least the places I went, I was the youngest person I knew by several years. Since I didnt spend a lot of time chatting with teenagers I didnt fall into bad habits (like using "u" and "2" as words).
The people who type like this don't understand that it just doesn't have a place in adult conversation. When you're in a forum where 98% of people speak correctly it just makes you look stupid to start typing like you're 12. It would be like going into a nice restaurant and behaving like you're in the school cafeteria.

 

[Ignatz]

I say it's just simply faster and get's the point across. In our fast pace world we live in, we can't be slow and must do everything fast. That's just modernization for ya.

But don't you see that any time you save by rapping out an ill-typed and misspelt message is lost when the recipient has to read it two or three times just to figure out what you're saying? (Not that your post was unclear; you obviously took some care with it, knowing what a bunch of finicky bastards you were addressing. The "ya" made me cringe, and the apostrophe in "get's," but I knew what you meant.)

 

[Ignatz]

I have to agree with timewarp. You're all sounding a tad FCC esque with this 'type how we say you should' attitude, I mean let people talk how they want, lol for Yoda's sake if no one elses 😛

"FCC-esque!" Oooowwwww...that's a low blow! I was a disc jockey for 18 years. To be compared to the Federales is hardly to be borne. Have you ever seen an FCC inspector up close? They all have this look on their faces...cold, implacable, unfuckwithable, like Laurence Olivier in "Marathon Man."
(If Yoda ever met one of them, soil his own robe he would.)

Anyway, as usual, Nessie has put the whole typing issue in an eloquent and sensible nutshell.

 

[Triple T1]

Aktually on my home planut of NEW JOISEY we all talk like this,you puny hoomans!

 

[maddhatter1]

its true that type of talk does not fit in adult conversation however the kids that type that way will not be kids forever and it will become a habit and pretty soon no one will have any idea what anyone is saying on the net..

 

[Yet_One_More_Idiot]

I've seen typing of this sort carry over into the real world™. Last week, on BBC2 I think, there was an hour-long programme about the evolution of the English language over the years, and it gave as one example a child who had actually written an entire "what I did in my summer holidays" essay in text talk.

The entire essay. 2 whole pages of "On 2sday, I wnt 2 da b33ch n snbthd 4 hrs...."

So yeah, eventually, the whole of the written side of the English language could degrade into this...rather difficult to understand form.



Ph33r m3 N my 133t h4x0r 5ki115! 😛 😎 😀
(Sorry, coudn't resist... 😀)

 

[Dude'sonfire]

Have you ever seen an FCC inspector up close? They all have this look on their faces...cold, implacable, unfuckwithable, like Laurence Olivier in "Marathon Man."

Lmao!! (that's laughing my ass off to those of you who need to know... hehehehe)

 

[-Kunoke-]

I've seen typing of this sort carry over into the real world™. Last week, on BBC2 I think, there was an hour-long programme about the evolution of the English language over the years, and it gave as one example a child who had actually written an entire "what I did in my summer holidays" essay in text talk.

The entire essay. 2 whole pages of "On 2sday, I wnt 2 da b33ch n snbthd 4 hrs...."

So yeah, eventually, the whole of the written side of the English language could degrade into this...rather difficult to understand form.



Ph33r m3 N my 133t h4x0r 5ki115! 😛 😎 😀
(Sorry, coudn't resist... 😀)

1337 5p34k. 😛 What a funny world we live in. But, Ness is right. When you get down to it, it comes to a matter of acting like adults, or acting like 12 year olds. :weird: Everyone knows how to type, write, and speak correctly. You learned them all a long time ago as a child. The fact that you choose to type like that just makes you look like an idiot. 😛

And yeah, I understand the thing with foreign people, and they don't bug me. Actually the ones around the TT are quite good at it and only mess up once in a while. So that's that.

 

[Dude'sonfire]

I'm going to defend stuff like lol (laughing out loud) and lmao (laughing my ass off), because these to me are kind of like emoticons: they express things which are harder to express in technical vocabulary. And you all seem to use emoticons freely so... 😛 hehe

 

[Yet_One_More_Idiot]

I use emoticons when I'm speaking! Once, in a phone conversation with my sister, she said something funny and I laughed in reply, and then I actually said "LOL" - then I realised that things are getting serious when netspeak is actually spoken... 🙂

 

[Goodieluver]

i am guilty of the following(note here also, no periods or capitalization)
U,yer,ya,eh,ur

y? cuz its easier and how i typed for years.