Irc chat slang dictionary manual#

Shortis observes that ROFL is a means of 'annotating text with stage directions'. Bidgoli likewise states that these initialisms 'save keystrokes for the sender but might make comprehension of the message more difficult for the receiver' and that 'lang may hold different meanings and lead to misunderstandings especially in international settings' he advises that they be used 'only when you are sure that the other person knows the meaning'. He describes the various initialisms of Internet slang as convenient, but warns that 'as ever more obscure acronyms emerge they can also be rather confusing'. Haig singles out LOL as one of the three most popular initialisms in Internet slang, alongside BFN ('bye for now') and IMHO ('in my honest/humble opinion'). They single out the example of 'ROFL' as not obviously being the abbreviation of 'rolling on the floor laughing' (emphasis added). Yunker and Barry in a study of online courses and how they can be improved through podcasting have found that these slang terms, and emoticons as well, are 'often misunderstood' by students and are 'difficult to decipher' unless their meanings are explained in advance. McWhorter stated that lol is utilized less as a reaction to something that is hilarious, but rather as a way to lighten the conversation. We linguists call things like that pragmatic particles…' Pragmatic particles are the words and phrases utilized to alleviate the awkward areas in casual conversation, such as oh in 'Oh, I don’t know' and uh when someone is thinking of something to say. Linguist John McWhorter stated, 'Lol is being used in a particular way.

Irc chat slang dictionary manual#

Laccetti (professor of humanities at Stevens Institute of Technology) and Molski, in their essay entitled The Lost Art of Writing, are critical of the terms, predicting reduced chances of employment for students who use such slang, stating that, 'Unfortunately for these students, their bosses will not be 'lol' when they read a report that lacks proper punctuation and grammar, has numerous misspellings, various made-up words, and silly acronyms.' Fondiller and Nerone in their style manual assert that 'professional or business communication should never be careless or poorly constructed' whether one is writing an electronic mail message or an article for publication, and warn against the use of smileys and abbreviations, stating that they are 'no more than e-mail slang and have no place in business communication'. The Oxford English Dictionary first listed LOL in March, 2011. These initialisms are controversial, and several authors recommend against their use, either in general or in specific contexts such as business communications.

The list of acronyms 'grows by the month', and they are collected along with emoticons and smileys into folk dictionaries that are circulated informally amongst users of Usenet, IRC, and other forms of (textual) computer-mediated communication. Other unrelated expansions include the now mostly obsolete 'lots of luck' or 'lots of love' used in letter-writing. It is one of many initialisms for expressing bodily reactions, in particular laughter, as text, including initialisms for more emphatic expressions of laughter such as LMAO ('laugh(ing) my ass off') and ROFL (or its older form ROTFL 'roll(ing) on the floor laughing'). It was first used almost exclusively on Usenet, but has since become widespread in other forms of computer-mediated communication and even face-to-face communication. LOL, or lol, is an acronym for laugh(ing) out loud or lots of laughs, and a popular element of Internet slang.