'r u online?': the evolving lexicon of wired teens

The Christian Science Monitor ^ | December 12, 2002 | Kris Axtman

[gitmo]

wtf?

[DainBramage]

bfd IMAO

[cmsgop]

"5"

[EggsAckley]

O I C

[gitmo]

ic2

[Tennessee_Bob]

http://www.doublecode.com/cgi-bin/babel.cgi?d=haxor&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freerepublic.com%2Ffocus%2Fnews%2F805613%2Fposts

[Spunky]

wtf?

Your blocked! ;-)

[Spunky]

WOW! HDYDT?

[Illbay]

Sounds like these kids are really series.

[freedumb2003]

btdt

I have been doing online communications since it was BITNET, over 10 years ago. We invented the internet shorthand.

Or, if you will...

bn o/l > 10 yrs nbd

(btdt=been there done that, nbd=no big deal)

[JenB]

Yeah, they're reel 133t d00dz these days. It's really annoying. Even people who email me without using punctuation, I can take, but this netspeak is something else.

[Senator Pardek]

WWCGEBD?

[Billthedrill]

Where in heaven's name have these people been since 1994?

[July 4th]

Even more interesting, I think, is the SMS culture that has developed all over the world where people use GSM mobile phones. You're limited to 160 characters/transmission, and you wouldn't believe how someone can cram a one page email into SMS shorthand.

I occasionally get SMS e-mails that someone has sent from their phone. I frequently need to search around the internet to find translations of the terms.

[Moose4]

You see shorthand like this a LOT in online gaming as well. I played Everquest off and on for 3 1/2 years (yes, I know, I have no life) and some of the stuff you'd see people type would just drive you nuts.

"d00d, u give a n00b money plz k thx?"

Maybe I'm a snob because I can type 90 wpm and spell reasonably well, but it always grated my nerves.

k thx drive thru stfu n00b.

}:-)4

[Ramius]

Yah... This reporter has evidently never heard of IRC. This stuff is not only not new... it's close to becoming passe.

[Revolting cat!]

Oy, vey! L.A.M.E.!

[perfect stranger]

(::[ ]::)

That's Darth Vadre's Tie-fighter. Isn't it?

[MatthewViti]

that really sux0r that u cant play quaker

[Tennessee_Bob]

Let's see - first time online was back in 1977, on the old ARPANET backbone, talking with a friend of mine in California. Using a highspeed 150 baud acoustic coupler modem, with a thermal printer for a display system. I was fourteen.

After that, got back into computers again in 1987, after I got my C-128, and that screaming 1200 baud cartridge modem. What a long, strange trip it's been