all right so welcome back I'm very excited about this module because I always learned something new about the English language from you guys and so looking forward to this discussion okay so let's talk about internet language so with the development of Technology the way that we communicate has changed over time right so it's not just spoken conversations that we have anymore so we have ways of communicating using technology like texting or instant messaging email social media and Twitter and things like that right I am very curious um like in your social group how do you communicate online like do you like like use text messaging or like Facebook group chats or is it Instagram and so I'm very curious um I heard that in Japan at least currently uh in 2022 Instagram is very popular as a means of communication um and so yeah let me know what's going on and so I feel like I use Facebook Messenger a lot I think and so I don't know if that's a millennial thing though okay so um so this kind of communication is sometimes called computer mediated communication or CMC because exactly we're using technology right as a means of communicating so with the development of computer mediated communication right that's a very unique way of communicating it's really different from spoken modes of communication and so like you know there's special kinds of needs that arise in this kind of medium right and so a little bit of history about computer mediated communication a little bit and so let's see when I was in like middle school so eighth grade I guess you'd say grade eight in Canada um or maybe like ninth grade which would be my freshman year in high school I think that's when I got my first cell phone um and so it was like one of those like you know Nokia like really kind of like heavy kind of sturdy kinds of phones certainly not a smartphone right and so it's just for calling and texting people uh and So eventually I did upgrade to like a flip phone and so like have you have you seen one of these before and so like hey yeah and so like this you know I remember having like as like an undergrad um and I think maybe like later years um in high school I think I had like a Blackberry or something like that but you know these kinds of phones were quite popular is it true that these are becoming popular again and so I don't know smartphones I heard people calling these like dumb phones [Laughter] as an antonym of smartphone that just like blows my mind but yeah it's very satisfying though like when you want to like hang up on someone you just go yeah okay so in any case so back in the days like high school I is like texting her friends right and so back in the days um first of all there were like character limits to your text messages I guess there is like still limits to an extent but like okay back in the days like if you went over a certain number of characters uh they would uh charge you more for those long text messages uh and so that's not something that you wanted right um the other thing that I remembered it's not totally relevant but like you know if you like if you like texted During certain hours of the day it was more expensive but like you know after hours like after like 9 00 PM or something the text messages were cheaper and so like I remember like yeah waiting until the evening to gossip about friends and things like that and so there are lots of limitations uh right and so like that's a limit and like we still see this too like on Twitter for example right those like micro blogging sort of platforms there's a limit as to how many characters that you can have okay the other thing about like like computer mediated communication is that there's no spoken intonation right because it's just the text that you have and so like how do you communicate things like intonation and your feelings and emotions okay um the other thing obviously is you're not directly in front of the person that you're speaking to and so there's no physical gesture and like there's no facial expression that you can sort of like actually literally communicate right and so like um when you have computer mediated communication like this we sort of need to find alternatives for all of these things right like spoken donation physical gesture and facial expression and when there's a character limit right you get clever about how you communicate as well okay so let's start with the character limit um and so obviously when there's a character limit uh you need to find ways to shorten your message and so abbreviations is a really good way of sort of making your messages shorter uh and so you might have you know things like LOL right classically speaking or you might have OMG j k t b h w t f BTW IMO in my opinion um so I feel like uh these ones are pretty like pretty like old like they have been around for a pretty long time but I think some of the newer ones or for example like like RN for like right now or V for very or P for pretty like when you say like like very cool be cool or pretty cool be cool right and so um I think I think like fomo like f-o-m-o fomo fear of missing out like that kind of thing I'm not sure if that's like already outdated um but you know that's also a kind of an abbreviation right uh and so what are some abbreviations that you use a lot in your online communication with friends for example are there any sort of new ones that I should be aware of and let me tell you right these kinds of things really matter because like it was like more expensive to have longer messages so these abbreviations were great but like these kinds of things kind of stuck around and like you know we'll talk about this in just a second but abbreviations aren't just abbreviations anymore they have like a particular meaning attached to them sometimes we'll talk about that in just a minute so one thing about abbreviations is that you know uh I think like sort of come and go right and so they're like very like popular ones at the time there's things like OMG and LOL that kind of like have stuck around but uh like I said you know things like you know IMO or like RN right feel kind of more contemporary to me so sometimes I'm on the internet let's say like on Instagram and like I see these like Instagram posts from like English Educators in Japan and so I see like like uh Instagram posts like this and so basically this says at the top um you know uh abbreviations that Americans use on social media uh and so this is what that says so OMG BTW ASAP JK c u WTF Etc um take a look at this right now and like uh what do you think like without me telling you too much right here what do you think about this kind of online language education do you think this is pretty accurate in terms of how people communicate online so there are some things about this that I notice for example like the capitalization of OMG uh and so I never write that in all caps unless I'm very excited my default is lowercase OMG is that also true for you too and so I feel like you know back in the 90s and the early 2000s like in your text messages I feel like you know people really understood these to be like acronyms and abbreviations and so I think people would you know put these things in all caps like OMG like all caps or capital LOL I feel like that was pretty common but I think more and more people sort of like don't like capitalize it anymore uh and so when someone like you know does like BTW in all cats that sort of has a very old social meaning for me that sort of strikes me as like oh yeah you don't sound like you're from my generation you sound a little bit older to me if I see lowercase BTW that's a little bit more neutral for me do you have this intuition too yeah um and some other things for me is that like ASAP for example as soon as possible I feel like that's not specific to internet language right I feel like that's sort of a general abbreviation that the English language has and so it's not very specific like like even if I like you know wrote in a pretty formal email like ASAP I don't think that would be completely inappropriate I think that's perfectly neutral but you know if I said BTW right in a formal email I think that would be a little bit off because that does carry sort of a more informal sort of tone for me um and so do you agree with this right some of these have sort of certain you know registers associated with it but some of these are a bit more neutral right um same thing with JK I would write that in lower case I think um I do want to know about sup what do you say do you say sup still like is that still a thing how do you say because is you say cuz I definitely don't say because I think I say BC for because what do you say let me know okay um WTF yeah Laura case for me and see you oh yeah this one's very really outdated like CU Capital C and like uppercase U is like this is what it sounds like it sounds like the 90s it sounds like the early 2000s to me and so like if you are learning like you know more contemporary English as an English learner for example be careful about some of the advice that you get online because yeah they could be quite outdated and it might be missing some of the social meaning that are behind some of these writings um and so like like this this post actually came with more pages and and so they also said things like this and so they said yeah CU is abbreviated as CU by Americans and this is like you know in the 2020s so we're talking about this is a very recent post but I don't know correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think Young Guru speakers say see you like this anymore this is like yeah like early 2000s abbreviation for me they're for it sounds a little bit old the other thing that really bothered me was like this was like applications of Cu on Instagram c-u-l is supposed to stand for see you later according to this teacher and cus is supposed to stand for see you soon I disagree with this heavily I have never used it that way nor have I ever seen anyone use it in this way but maybe that's just my dialect of Internet language and so yeah that's the thing right and so this like very informal register of English right online Internet language there's different versions of it like the way that Millennials use online language is probably different from how gen Z speakers use it and like different from like how Boomers use it and so there are different dialects of Internet language and so let me know maybe maybe some people do do this what do you think like what would you think if you if you saw this right I wouldn't understand cus like I wouldn't know what that meant if I saw it I think yeah okay so as you can see here I feel like capitalization matters right in online communication I think like the association is very different sometimes the social meaning changes um and so like um when you say WTF is that right I would write this as like WTF lowercase okay but like if you put this in uppercase for me WTF is that this is borderline ungrammatical for me like I almost want to put an asterisk in front of this because like like unless you're like yelling or something like that I think this is a little bit weird for my particular dialect of Internet English um and so uh same thing with like BTW like I call the landlord by the way I would write it with lower case like this but if this was uppercase I call the landlord BTW oh this sounds really really awkward to me like I would not put that in all caps um especially because presumably yeah you're not yelling right here right uh speaking of which right and so capitalization number one I can say a lot about the social meaning and so like what generation you're from I think it can sound a little bit old I think depending on whether you capitalize it or not but there are also other systematic uses of capitalization right and so for example let's look at this uh conversation right here okay okay so Fabiola says Paxton is watch talking over here right let's pretend that this is a text message conversation and Devi says OMG okay compare this to Paxton is walking over here OMG but in all caps this time okay what's the difference for you between this one and this one like lowercase versus uppercase for me the first one is kind of like Paxton is walking over here oh my God right it's like it's not necessarily like like lots of excitement or anything like that or it could be excited but not necessarily I think yeah and so but this one with all caps is definitely like Paxton's walking over here oh my God right so like it's a lot of like excitement that's associated with it right and so this kind of goes back to like the accommodations that we make in computer mediated communication so we don't have spoken intonation and so like how do we like express ourselves like without intonation I feel like you know capitalization is one way of sort of manipulating that and another place where the capitalization really kind of affects the meaning of your message is like LOL right and so uh so in this conversation right and so Kamala says why are you in a wheelchair in this picture and Debbie says I was paralyzed from the waist down when my dad died okay so that's a pretty you know neutral kind of conversation I would say right but sometimes right people put LOL at the end of of things and so but in this case lower case right so why are you in a wheelchair in this picture I was paralyzed from the waist down when my dad died LOL lower case Okay uh this is acceptable to me I think this is an acceptable grammatical use of lowercase LOL okay what I want to know from you is what if this was uppercase why are you in a wheelchair in this picture I was paralyzed from the waist down when my dad died capital o l uh in this context this again sort of borders on being kind of weird and ungrammatical almost like the only way that I can interpret this is that Devi genuinely thinks that this is funny is the interpretation that I get from this conversation do you agree with me so capitalization does matter right it can sort of change your perception of like how old you are and sometimes it can change like the intonation that's accompanied by yet and it can sort of also change the meaning completely sometimes like whether you're actually laughing or not is something that can be affected too and I'm sure you know this very well right if you're watching this like I'm sure you like communicate with your friends right very fluidly using these techniques and so I'm very excited to hear from you this week about what sorts of things you do in your online communication okay so um one of the things I really really want to hear is about this LOL okay and so let's talk about LOL in particular in the next video how does one laugh online and is LOL even laughing anymore okay all right see you in the next video