People...you know the type... That use....all...the...sodding....time.

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

Aaaaahhh.... it makes me... want to.... scream.... what... I wonder.... is... the actual point?

I have no idea why people do it, or what effect they are trying to achieve. Am I missing something or I'd it a blatant misuse of a full stop?
I understand the use when you occasionally want to lead the reader on, and make them wait, for example

"I've just seen..... a flying pig"

But what is the use at the end, and even in the middle of, a normal sentence.

[Pagwatch]

Damn you BIWI . Being pedantic in a section for pedantry.

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

whatthebleep I have to repeat what BIWI said. This is pedants corner not aibu.
I don't give a ...(insert word of choice).... what you think. I'm being pedantic and saying it frustrates me.

On a pedantic note; why can the reader no longer be trusted to insert the breaks as they see fit? Which would usually be where the grammar (such as parenthesis, commas, colons and full stops, etc.) allowed them to be. The use of "....." seems a complete misuse of the full stop to me.

[whatthewhatthebleep]

opinion .... I can comment too...no?

going now, won't be back....I don't give a ...(insert word of choice)...either

[aquavit]

they are elisions, not ellipses

which should tell you everything you need to know about when it's appropriate to use them

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

Well what do you expect whatthebleep when you come storming into pedant corner with you yabu style comment.
Um, I think you will find I can be pedantic in pedant corner, as that is the point of this section.

[SauvignonBlanche]

I agree OP, I just opened a post that was littered with ellipses and just closed it again. It's too annoying to read.

[TheDeathAndGlories]

I use them on forums and on Facebook as I write as if I was (were?) chatting.
I wouldn't use them in anything formal or even in emails, except maybe to dh.

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

sauvignon I'm glad its not just me, i had a annoying message on the dreaded FB this morning, that was so difficult to read, and gave me a headache trying.

[Pagwatch]

Its not that you can't comment whatthewhatthebleep.
It's just the bit of your post about 'don't you have enough to think about' and the suggestion that people shouldn't comment when the thread is in this section is odd.
It's like going to chicken keepers and saying 'how can you lot waste your time on those clucky fuckers' or to style and beauty and posting 'bags are a bit pointless. You lot should shut up'

Of course you may do it but it does look a bit dim.

[drjohnsonscat]

I think it's to replace !

"Clever" people know not to use ! in posts and emails so they use...instead because it sort of means "big build up" and so avoids the need to use !!!!!

I'm campaiging for the return of ! Because it's fine and we should all just get over ourselves.

BTW, Jeanette Winterson uses .... all the time in her most recent book (the memoir, can't remember the name). It did actually drive me a bit mad.

[whatthewhatthebleep]

obviously I have made an error coming into this area...apologies!...carry on....

I don't think there use is defined by ellipses or elisions...I think they are more to do with typing a comment, advice or whatever as though you were talking/chatting in conversation....I'm not sure how this is defined but I don't think these do it tbh...anyway, never mind me..I'm probably just a dotty person and it seems to make good sense to me...whatever

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

for pagwatch

[ExasperatedSigh]

Don't have a problem with this myself (unsurprisingly since I do it all the time) but just had to say that I really hate it when people post. like. this. for effect. It really really fucking fucks me off.

[SauvignonBlanche]

I think you'll find that it's 'their' use, not 'there'.
I wouldn't normally point that out, I think it's bad form but, as this is Pedants' corner, I'll allow myself to.

[imperialstateknickers]

I've never known what they're called, I read them as dot dot dot, but I know perfectly well what they mean.

I would use them to indicate a pause, before the punchline of a joke.

Or at the end of a sentence to mean 'I leave it to your imagination what happened next'.

I would not use them to replace common easily available bits of punctuation, which I find just as infuriating to read as OP does.

As an example here is my own post from the parentbrain thread

'I put a french stick away in the kettle. It wouldn't fit properly in the kettle, I spent some time breaking it up into lengths that would fit, then jammed the lid down with a sense of satisfaction. Then put rest of shopping away, then decided to have some tea as ddtwins were still asleep in buggy.

Took kettle to sink to fill it...'

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

I'm sure that if I can manage to type without using "...." all the time, and still manage to "sound" to the reader like I am chatting, then why exactly is "...." or "what. exap. said." being used?

I don't understand why I cannot be trusted to put my own damn breathing spaces in? there's not going to be many official letters or essays being written or read on a "chat" forum I think it is obvious it will be a chatty post, without the need for "....."

[FrustratedSycamoreBonks]

ISK your use is acceptable. how pregnant were you?

[Ponders]

goodness, ISK, twins must mess with your head much more than singletons

[WMittens]

I do it. I write like I speak, so the dots are where I'm pausing.

We have commas to signify pauses.

they are elisions, not ellipses

From wiki: "Elision is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase, producing a result that is easier for the speaker to pronounce.

In Native English, elision comes naturally, and it is often described as "slurred" or "muted." Often, elision is deliberate. It is a common misconception that contractions automatically qualify as elided words, which comes from slack definitions. Not all elided words are contractions and not all contractions are elided words (for example, 'going to' -> gonna: an elision that is not a contraction; 'can not' cannot: a contraction that is not an elision)."

"..." is nothing to do with elisions

[picnicbasketcase]

The occasional one I don't mind, it's the posts where there is no other punctuation that get on my tits.

[JudeFawley]

I have a friend who sends me long e-mails.

They consist entirely of caps, dots and exclamation marks.

THEY LOOK.....LIKE THIS!!!!!!!

Most annoying.

[HappyTurquoise]

Guilty as charged M'lud...

[BelfastBloke]

Looks like most of us pedants use it ...

and many more of us don't mind it ...

It has the Mumsnet Pendandts Seal of Approval!

[HappyTurquoise]

The dots are for when I am thinking something that cannot be said (because it would offend and the thread would go off at a tangent, or because I want the OP to be led to their own conclusions, or because I'm brainstorming lots of ideas and don't have words for the in between thoughts, or because I am hungover and hard of thinking.)

[SummerRain]

A comma is a short pause in a sentence, or two commas to contain a slightly separate thought which is relevant to the meaning of the sentance. The ellipses are for a longer pause or for an altogether different thought extrapolated from my original idea.

'My son, who is 5, is behaving very badly today'

'My son is behaving badly today... I wonder is it just the age he's at?'

Sorry, not the best example but I haven't had my morning cuppa yet!