Do you think people who use this language are...

[SunshineSetty]

Generally less intelligent/educated than those who don’t? Or just lazy?

Things like:
It will b gr8 2 c u! Thanks 4 bookin it lol!

Sometimes see this on social media and it grates on me as it’s so easy to spell correctly nowadays and how much longer does it take to type ‘You’ instead of ‘u’?! I also don’t get every other sentence ending with ‘lol!’

This thread has me ROFL.

It was meant in a lighthearted way! Lockdown boredom

Not sure they are less intelligent, more irritating though.
I can’t understand quite a lot of what my 19 year old DD texts me.
LOL is hugely irritating. I work with a woman who uses lol as a full stop.
Her work WhatsApp generally has 5 or more lols in. Sometimes inappropriate too.
Worst one was asking me to go to the hospital lol to support a woman with LD on A ward where she had been admitted for C19. LOL

People who overuse exclamation marks are generally less intelligent/educated than those who don’t.

generally less intelligent/educated than those who don’t? Or just lazy?

A teenager, immature or lazy.
As a result of many years of copywriting and proofreading I have turned into the grammar police (in my mind only)

I write like above, it's total laziness. I should do more.

It's a combination of laziness and trend following imo but we all do it to a certain extent don't we?

My daughter is 16 and uses texting to communicate throughout her day.

She gets upset if I respond using punctuation, as apparently this indicates the sender has been upset by the recipient.

Could this been a teenager thing, a way of excluding older generations, similar to ways teenagers use language?

but we all do it to a certain extent don't we?

Nope. I just find it irritating to read, and find it much easier to type out the words than try to remember what the "shortcut" is. Besides, it would be rather hypocritical of me to do so

Doesn't it hark back to the days of the old style mobile phones?

Test speak started with early-ish mobile phones with SMS where texts had a character limit and were 15p or so per text. (when you only had a £5 top up, 15ps added up fast).

So gr8 saved 2 characters, 2cu saved 7 (with spaces) etc.

I suppose it's just a spill over from that. Twitter still has a character limit, so some social media still needs a bit of creativity to fit your whole post in.

I hate it and find it obscures the reader's ability to understand what somebody is trying to say, so although not necessarily less intelligent per se, it does make you come across as lacking in good communication skills, whether that is indeed the case or not - in the same way that punctuating your sentences with extraneous adjectival swear words every second word makes you sound like you don't have a very large vocabulary.

Back in the days when you had to jab at a single button up to four times for one single letter and then wait two seconds before registering the second letter, there was a purpose to it; but now we have smart phones with full touch-sensitive keyboards and predictive text, it makes very little sense at all to me these days.

I hate it but then I love emojis so can't judge 😁

@DontStopThinkingAboutTomorrow

Test speak started with early-ish mobile phones with SMS where texts had a character limit and were 15p or so per text. (when you only had a £5 top up, 15ps added up fast).

So gr8 saved 2 characters, 2cu saved 7 (with spaces) etc.

I suppose it's just a spill over from that. Twitter still has a character limit, so some social media still needs a bit of creativity to fit your whole post in.

Yes, that was how it was when I first got a mobile and I hated it. I always use full words and proper punctuation in texts. Mainly as I have several autistic friends and realise the need for unambiguous communication as far as they are concerned.

Maybe. I tend to use it in texts because I can never get the text right. I sometimes find myself typing the sentence 5 times then think sod it and put in as few characters as I can!

Entirely dependent on your friends, I would think?
People just do what is ‘normal’ to them.

I don’t mind it at all. It can be extremely creative. It’s just language evolved to fit a format, at the end of the day. (I’m a professional writer too.)

I can6say I care really. We ultimately choose how we write, for the mostpart so it isn't necessarily a reflection on anything othrt than choice or the amount of effort the person wants to use. It's hardly a reliablenmeteic for their intelligence so why bother trying to make it one. It's just snobbery. No different to those who make a real point of trying to sound intelligent, it doesn't actually mean they are in a broader sense.

That's a very dated way of texting. I wouldn't judge the persons intelligence, but I would find it a bit odd because I dont think I've seen abbreviations like "gr8" for at least 10 years

I'm an English teacher and don't write like that, but not do I have a problem with it.
It's generally been superceded now as "text speak" came into being in the early-mid nineties when you paid for text messages and had to keep them short
Teenagers, consequently, are too young to use this kind of language. At our school we made the mistake of having a module which looked at text speak and the kids just laughed at us and said only their parents still used that kind of thing.
If I saw text speak anywhere, I'd think the writer was, say, aged between 30 and 50.

I prefer textspeak in small doses to poor spelling in large ones.

@PurpleDaisies

People who overuse exclamation marks are generally less intelligent/educated than those who don’t.

I have to stop myself putting exclamation marks at the end of every sentence!

Poorly educated and probably younger than 25 is my guess. Anyone who had my English teacher back in the day simply could not write such things. I feel guilt and shame just using a contraction.

For some reason the over use of exclamation marks grates on me. You see some posters doing it on here. At the end of every sentence, and often multiple ones too. It really distracts from the content.

They are supposed to be used at the end of exclamation sentences, to show strong emotion, it’s like writing “wow” at the end of the sentence. And yet you see things like this often...

“Yesterday I went to the shops!! It was cold outside!! I needed bread!!!! But it was raining!!!! Was I unreasonable to take my new born!!. I wrapped them up well!!!!! My Husband says I was wrong!! Due to Covid and the bad weather!!!!”

It’s just so wrong.

Another one here who loves exclamation marks. Also overuse capitals. I think it's because I'm so loud in real life, I'm afraid people won't quite hear my typing if I DON'T ENUNCIATE AND EXCLAIM❗ I don't like lol though and find it irritating and weirdly submissive.

Bluntness I just read that as an overexcited person shrieking. So maybe it does actually serve a purpose...... What is the general feeling on dot dot dot? I overuse that too. I sort of mean "what do you think? Fill in the rest as you see fit"