The English language on the Internet
 

It is quite a culture shock sometimes when you post on other boards. Someone on the RSX forum I occasionally read posted this:

hey guys like it says i have this rear bumper comes with the lip still panited camp white sellin for 350 i think thats a good price since icb sells the bumper with lip for 400+. should have pics up 2marro. let me know ooo and thats 350 P/U. i will ship if i can find a box big enough for it so 350 + shipping or 350 P/U

:rolleyes:

What is the Internet doing to our language? I proof my text at least once for errors. I can't be the only one! PParts readers seem to know that prolly (probably) is not a word!

Arrrggghhh!

Sorry, rant over.

I don't think it's the internet. It looks like this one had a rough time getting out of 2nd grade english class.

I'm still somewhat active on a paintball BBS. I saw posts like this all the time. I frequently had to reply "I have no idea what you are trying to say."

Funny story. We had an external project planner here a few years ago who wrote like that. No one could understand her e-mails. I was instrumental in showing her the door. If she was an internal, I would have at least given her a chance to improve. I expect externals to show up ready to hit the ground running. That is what they are paid for. I made a very angry phone call to her employer (as I saw it as their responsibility to supply qualified people).

I have been on the internet since 95 some time, and have been on, and still get on, many internet forums such as this one.

Poor writing skills are rampant among the younger generation. I'm talking atrocious spelling, horrific grammar, wrong tenses, wrong use of punctuation...

And it's hard not to treat them as dumbasses, because they sound like dumbasses...

I get emails like that all the time via my VW bus web site. OTOH, the emails I get from Porsche people are generally grammatically correct, with proper spelling, punctuation, and not much in the way of 'texting' shortcuts.

u make funna me 4 my typing i think i type fine jus coz u cant read wut i write doest make u stupid u azzhol3 jus coz english mebbee not my firs langaj u think it funny to maake fun n who cares if my aposterphy is in the rong place n-e-way effer!!1 so wot if my grammers nott prefect u no wat im tryg to say n-e-way rite n if u dont well who cares bout yer cocky azz neway.

I've noticed this a lot too, huge pet peeve of mine. I can't even write a text message on my phone in shorthand, I try, it looks wrong, and I just correct it and put in punctuation. It's really not *that* hard.

About people you work with; we had someone here at the office, one of the owners actually, that wrote all of their e-mails in shorthand.

There was definately thoughts going through their head, but it was all taken down as notes and then sent off to someone as if they'd have a clue.

It's hard to describe, and I can't find a good one as an example right now, but I'm sure some of you have experienced the same thing. Basically notes, just half sentences, incomplete thoughts, etc. sent in an e-mail.

Another thing is the English as a 2nd language excuse. I don't know if I completely buy that.

Most people that I know that have English as a 2nd language can read and write it better than the majority of Americans. At the very least you can tell that they attempted to create a good sentence even if it's not quite right, and aren't just being lazy.

I do the same as Llama... I send text messages a lot from my phone with several friends, and it's really not difficult to spell out a whole word.

I'm 26. I'm repeatedly offended by the lack of grammar skills exhibited by friends that I grew up with and went to school with. Some of them I had the very same English classes with!

On the other hand, I think that when I took Spanish in high school that my grammar improved markedly. I still speak very poor Spanish, but the classes did teach me how to deconstruct English.

Sounds like that post deserves a rabbit with a pancake on its head.

Man, I hate quotes. I can never get them figured out. I have a grammar book sitting on my shelf right here, but I still can't tame the quotes. Sometimes I'll be writing something that needs a "quote" of some kind, but I never know for sure where to stick the comma or punctuation, so I just randomly throw it in there wherever looks good.

Teh innernet 0wnz u, d00dz....

Well, with quotes, especially when you do air quotes, don't use it to say I'm "sorry", that's not using it right. ;)

The English language has changed significantly. I think that when typing quickly and on a BBS, their has to be a level of understanding which is really all that counts. If on the other hand you are sending an email for business, it should not only be grammatically correct but your spelling should be right as well. This should not be hard especially with spell check and other tools available. I know if I don't reread what I type, I am bound to miss a word or spell something incorrectly.

These are quotes I read, or tried to read, on another forum I belong to. I honestly couldn't translate them for myself. I might run the through Babel fish, and see what it comes up with.

Enjoy:

Those are both totally unedited, copied and pasted in their entirety(sp?) I'd spell check that one word, but it would take too long to get to it. :p


P.S. This isn't someone who just learned English as their second or third language, as those people generally have a better grasp of it than this guy from North Carolina has.

Well I tried out Babel fish, and unfortunately, there isn't a 'Moron to English' translation. So, I translated the 2nd quote into Dutch, then translated the Dutch response back into English.


I still can't figure it out :D

you don't say?

I have to ask, when did making a word plural entail an apostrophe?

I have several coffee mug's.

WTF?!?

my personal pet peeve. the rule seems to be that if the word ends with an "s" then it is mandatory to cram a f%$*#ng apostrophe in there. don't get me started

there was a thread about this whole language bastardization thing not too long ago...