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Well, since the beginning of the internet, even before the world wide web, people have used chat speak to make the conversation go faster. However, the text talk has evolved from abriviations of a set of words that were used a lot, ie: lol, lmao, brb, to taking out vowels. My only issue with it, besides the fact that it's hard to read, is that I can't take someone serious that can't even take pride in their vocabulary, and to me, people who speak like that, come across as unintellegent.

I know I personally used to use it out of sheer laziness and as a space filler for when I didn't have anything to say late at night. The lack of human contact involved in instant messaging caused that problem. One of my favorite aspects of human conversation is the non-awkward pause. It's so nice to have someone understand you without words. But that is really difficult to recreate over computers due to the lack of body language. So when you don't have anything to say in reply, all you can do is use an emoticon or an "lol". And that need to fill blank space is a really difficult habit to break.

My vote goes to Peer Validation. Somebody goes to a forum, MySpace, or whatever, sees most of the people there using 'txt-talk' and finally deciphers it. They then see it is a faster way to get things across. So they use it.

Unfortunantly, that's how I got into it, but stopped myself when I realized I was typing SLOWER then I normally do. eek

I do like the Emoticons though.

It really could be any combination of things - TV, the internet, cell phones, etc. Not to mention the modern thing is to go paperless. If you ask me, I'd rather read a book or write a letter than watch TV. Usually if there is a movie based on a book and I'd like to see that movie I always make it a point to read the book first. I watched the Black Stallion before I ever read the book - but I read the book later and liked the book SO much better than the movie. The movie was still good, but there is just nothing like exploring a new world through literature. And especially with this particular movie so much of the book was left out - like the fact that in the book he had a mom and a dad, and in the movie he only had a mom. Just little things like that. I read the DaVinci Code before seeing the movie and I'm really glad I did - I think the movie alone would have lost all meaning. But having read the book first there were some things that the movie did clear up. And I liked the fact that this movie followed the book almost precisely. Okay, I'm done on my soap box now. Hope I haven't bored anyone to death.

I blame laziness. If people weren't so lazy, they wouldn't just tell their kids to go watch TV or get on the computer. If they actually cared they would do something. And if our peers weren't so lazy they would actually play a game or something. There's more to life than the computer and the TV. Hell, even spellcheck misses half the words that aren't right, and then it thinks that there's something wrong with the grammar that isn't. If that isn't bad, I don't know what is. Sadly, it probably recognizes "txt tlk." I hate "txt tlk." I actually had to ask someone what they typed because I could even see how the letters were supposed to go together! I made me feel dumb, but then I realized that they were dumb for not being able to spell out what they meant.

I should probably stop ranting now. Otherwise I'll have written an essay on the decline of literature. I alreayd wrote one on the decline of classical music. sweatdrop

stare Have any of you ever read the book 1984? In their society they use a similar type of language called Newspeak. The entire purpose of it is to eradicate the use of modern language so that everything you say contradicts itself, eventually making thought crime or even true thought impossibly negated. evil Read it. It kicks a**. evil

Well, I don't know how America is influenced by bad literacy but I do know how modern England is. I am presuming the stories of my hometown and yours are somewhat similar. People are just too lazy to type out all of their words in full. That is the be all and end all of it, LAZINESS

I blame it on pure laziness. One of my friends sent me a fairly illiterate text message the other day. There were no periods, capitals, or proper spellings of words. It took me a few minutes to understand what he was trying to say to me, and I sent him a message telling him so. He replied that he was just too lazy to to it properly. It irks me every time I get a text message from him.