to be appalled at the increase of text speak on Mumsnet?

[AnUnnamedSource]

There seems to be a lot more "ur", "lols", "u" etc than usual.

Am I being unreasonable and old or is it annoying others?

No one is talking about acronyms or normal abbreviations - they're fine!

Text speak is not. Apart from anything else, the people using 'readers' can't understand it, so it's rude.

People used to get told it wasn't on - I don't see that happening now, so it's edging its way in!

Clearly it annoys a lot of us... so what are we going to do about it? I think it we had a standard, friendly, just letting you know phrase that we all used it would stop it and it wouldn't come across as a personal attack... what do you think and what could we say??

Something like... 'Could you please not post in text speak. Some posters use readers and they are unable to understand posts with text speak and the rest of us want to throttle you and as it's not a text message it's not necessary or desirable' ?? I'm sure someone can (vastly) improve on that!!

"I never post when the opening poster has used text speak or LOL."

I have been guilty of using LOL because their is no laughing smiley on here, unlike other forums.

Why is there no LOL smiley?

Here's what I think of most text speak: its unreadable. If you must use text speak please add a translation for those of use who do not speak that language written in English.

It's when they add extra letters that I really don't get it.

"Wooowwwww darlinnnnnng you look gawjuss" xxxx

WTF? It's random - not like actually trying to show an elongation of the word if it was being actually spoken, it's just thrown in there. WTF indeed.

Gawjuss is another pet peeve of mine - seen it from grown women who clearly know how to spell gorgeous, yet choose to do THAT to the English language.

You are not being unreasonable. I prefer to read full sentences. I know what you mean about extra letters...and you can see its not a typo when they do it regularly:

ie: babeyy - HATE IT

But something I struggle with (more from ignorance of chat rooms I suppose)
is the Acronyms/Initialism/etc of YANBU/IYKWIM/DS/DD/DH

Okay - I get You are not being unreasonable, darling(?) son, daughter, husband. but IYKWIM? Im pretty new to mumsnet and the internet in general I dont do facebook (my sons do) so I struggle with these and have to give it thought when Im reading it. Is there a list anywhereof these things?

And with a lot of people having smart phones now which spell and even put in apostrophes for you - is there an excuse?

If you look uo the top under 'Mumsnet Talk' you will see 'Acronyms' - most of them are listed there... else just post a lot and you'll pick it up! :)

I don't like textspeak on a forum but do use it on my phone, otherwise my thumbnail starts to hurt with all those long words. I love some of the texts I receive from young people, chock full of ingenious textspeak, as it comes across as affectionate, which is lovely - sucker for affection, me.

I'm a bit touchy about people being critical of spelling (dd dyslexic) and grammer (me: poor education) and tend to think that as long as you know what someone is getting at that's all that matters. I can't understand what someone is getting at when they use textspeak on a forum so I have to stop to work it out. It's also worrying that I think people are genuinely losing the ability to spell or form proper sentences (even if the grammar is shocking sometimes )

I am with constantlywrong on the adding extra letters, what is that in aid of? Isn't textspeak meant to be a shorter version? For example on my 16 year old cousin's facebook profile full of tuh instead of to, watt instead of what, babay instead of baby, yhou instead of you. It really annoys me I have to hide her from my newsfeed

'Gawjuss' and 'babeyy' make me throw up in my mouth a bit.

Are deliberate misspellings supposed to indicate that the writer is informal and a bit cute and different and individual?

i have a phone that uses swype and its much easier to actually spell the proper words than daft abbreviations

The phonetic spelling of Gawjuss and the like tell me all I need to know about that person and their intelligence.

(and the likely hood is they just can't spell gorgeous)

or indeed likelihood?

(sorry, truly couldn't help it!)

Aquavit- you bugger

That's the second time my spelling has been corrected today,
I am ill That's my excuse.

Taking nose out of the air.

I always write out messages in full English on my phone, then have to go back through the message, shortening it down with text speak, until it is within the number of characters per message limit. Maybe I should get a new phone....

sorry foofffy, it was v mean of me

get better soon!

thelittlefriend - or you could just phone them...

ChippingIn thanks for the tip now I know how every letter of the alphabet can contribute to acronyms hehe

I had to laugh yesterday when I read a news article in our local paper. A load of people turned up to the wrong funeral because a of a textspeak misunderstanding.

The text read - funeral at St X church and at X cem afterwards. So they all went to the crem instead and witnessed a complete stranger being cremated.