Text Message Lingo

[Tim Allaire]

Is it me or do you spend more time trying to find out what the text message lingo (TML) means than you do actually getting to the threads you want to see?

LOML
IMO
IDK--okay I know what they mean...NOW! (after hours of deliberation)
There is like a hundred more...

[Rick Gifford]

Actually if someone would do a google search for online abreviations/chat abbreviations you'll find lists pages long.

Way to many to know them all that's for sure.

This is the only place I see LOML. I had to think a moment when I first saw it. I usually call mine The Boss.

[Tim Allaire]

HA! Yeah, she actually figured that one out herself (before I did).

[Joseph N. Myers]

Tim,

Do a search on "acronyms" and you'll see a thread labeled "List Of Acronyms, Updated 4/17/2007". Give that a try, you'll like it!

HTH, Joe

[Per Swenson]

No reflection on the people who use the abbreviations,

Its not their Fault. But it makes me cringe.

The decline of Western civilization.

Oh it gets worse. My son, newly minted at 18 has peers

that actually talk to each other in that vernacular.

But then, while gaskets and hoses are wrenched from their moorings

inside my brain, it is everything in my power to resist

jamming that screw driver in my ear, I reflect back on my speech

from the 60s and 70s. Far out man, Fantanbulous, out a state.

Excuse me anyone hear speak Jive? Remember that from Airplane?

Side note, Had a customer who had a FYI habit.

In a irritating sing song voice after every spoken paragraph.

I cured her of that quirk.

Started speaking just like her.

Then asked if I sounded stupid.

She apologized.

TTFN

Per

[Tim Allaire]

I appreciate the laugh! I guess the ever changing internet/technology has won once again, let alone colloquial vernacular of 2000's (I am a highschool English teacher and feel myself falling behind the times).

[Jim Becker]

Tim, in one of the adoption forums I visit, there was recently a discussion about "inventive spelling" being used at early ages...presumably in some schools. Here's an excerpt of a post by someone named, Dallas_dad:

English spells things so oddly mostly because our words come from so many different languages originally, and the spellings are vestiges of either original transliterations or historical pronunciations.

We're not getting better as time goes on. Neologisms tend to fall into two main categories: Scientific/medical words, which follow the Latinate rules, and faddish words, which tend to follow Anglo-Saxon rules. In either case, though, native English speakers have no trouble reading or spelling these new words. It's still the old, common words that give people trouble.

There have been many movements toward spelling reform over the past several hundred years. Most of them have failed, not because they're not sensible, but because they involve too much change. Mark Twain summed it up pretty well:

For example, in Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all.

Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.

Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spikingwerld.

Kinda along the same lines...LOL

[Al Willits]

I don't text, rarely use the phone in fact, but if you text me in some sort of foreign tongue I will not reply, and if you axe me a question I will ignore you, while my English is not the queens version, I at least try to communicate in real words...well, most the time.

Unless of course if you axe me if I want that 60bf of bubinga free...

Al....wo's disregarding the entire 60's and most of the 70's... it was far out, dude!

[Greg Muller]

The Beckers-
It took me a while, but I got through the whole spiel...
Still laughing, and now taking aspirin, thanks...

Greg

[Pat Germain]

A lot of the texting lingo has actually been around for decades. The military used to use it for their teletypes, which were pretty much very large texting machines. Some of those terms were:

- ZUJ = Stand by
- CIP = Come In Please
- CYA = See You
- BCNU + Be Seeing You
- TTFN + Ta Ta For Now

There was also an abbreviation for "See You Next Time". That fell out of favor when one of my coworkers used it and found the person at the other end was female.

[Shawn Walker]

I find LOML the most irritating. I feel like there should be a song playing in the background everytime I see that.
Well I feel better now that I got that off my chest.

[Tim Allaire]

I dont know if I would say that about the LOML...HA HA!!

[Al Wasser]

It is partly to blame on what we hear on TV and radio. Cops, not the police, the feds, the white house says (huh a talking house), etc. Add the stupid commercials and announcers that must have passed 4th grade english. How many times did Aikman say "I mean" during the super bowl. He's about to sound as stupid as Madden.

[Rick Gifford]

FOUTHEBOWD

Used to describe someone.

Fell Out Ugly Tree Hit Every Branch On Way Down