I’ve noticed this with my daughter and some others who text a lot. If presented in a written form, they miss a lot of what’s written. But if the communication is a lot of "r"s and "u"s and the like they can tell you every thing that’s there, word for word.
I’ve also noticed that they use a lot of the abbreviations when they try to write, even in business. An example:
“Ok ok, so i sent 1 2 many e-mails. it was a weird thing. my stupid Yahoo isn’t working right 4 some reason. it’s not my computer, at least not this time. 
im learning spanish, im so excited! i learned a song about a cat, 2 learn the vowels. cool eh?”
Notice the lack of caps?
I love my kids. 
Is the old school written language going away, you think?
Peace,
mangeorge
could b
Look at the average bebo account and try to decipher what has been written.
You mean that abbreviation might actually convey things more succinctly? Well, I’ll be damned.
Not that many people have ever been forced to really assess just how much unnecessary language they are churning out. Reducing something to its salient points is a real challenge. One option is to eschew most grammar, as can be done with text messages. Or just choose other words.
Well, it kind of jars me, just a little, but I’m an old fuddie-duddie.
Speaking as an 18-year old, nothing will have me judge you faster if you craft your written communications that way. I understand it originated in a time where texts were 150 letters or less and you had to cram in as much as possible, but now?
It indicates a laziness on the part of the writer, since they could not be bothered to do you the courtesy of formulating a sentence.
Really, it bums me out if a guy I like texts me lyke we shd ttaly hang 2day! I can barely bring myself to write " 'cause" instead of “because”, and yes, I’ll include the little dash.
Luckily I’m not the only one; full sentences in written communications seem to become cool again once you hit university.
I’m 16 and I text all the time. My friends and I wouldn’t be caught dead holding a cell with an outgoing text that has “2” or “u” or “r” in place of actual words. I just can’t take anyone seriously who does that.
Are we snobs? Probably. But that’s not all of the reason behind it, we just figured out a long time ago that it’s hard to understand each other if we don’t use English. Punctuation can totally change the meaning of a sentence. see eats shoots and leaves) Capitalization is really the only thing we don’t always do.
Speaking as a 20 year old, I can’t stand poor grammar in text messages. I also don’t think you’re going to get a decent answer to this question on this board, which self-selects members for adherence to grammar and spelling rules.
I don’t do a lot of person to person texting, but I tweet via sms. I usually do ok with grammar/spelling. But I’m much more succinct, what with the 140 character limit.
But occasionally when I’m trying to say something, I will make some abbreviations.
I do read, though - I’ve got the whole librarian gig going on, so reading - yeah, part of my life. 
With T-9 anyone who uses that crap is being willfully immature and trite. T-9 makes using full words and caps/punctuation almost easier than leet-speak.
Someone who is used to old style texting will be able to text in short hand much quicker than they can use predictive text. They’re not being willfully anything.
Also, T-9 learns things you type in so after a while it defaults to txt spk! I’ve had to teach dirty words to every single phone I’ve owned–you think they’d just go ahead and add it all to the dictionary in the first place…
I’ve read leet speak ever since there was leet speak. I guess it’s because I don’t text but I’ve never been able to read anything without reasonable spelling/punctuation/grammar/capitalization/kitchen sink anywhere near as quickly.
I find it rather selfish. It’s all about how fast it is to type, not how quickly or easily the person on the other end can read or understand.
It’s coming! You can’t hold it back!
My understanding was that it was so people could write their messages quicker rather than truncate them to save space, but perhaps it is a combination of the two. On a numeric keypad without predictive text it takes quite a while to write a message correctly. What I find funny is how it prevails even when txters are using a computer keyboard in a context where space is not an issue.
yeah, I was always totally grammatical in my texting when I had T9 mode, but now that I’m confined to only ABC I find myself typing U, B, etc. I hate it, but it takes freaking forever to type everything out.
Not a question, my friend. More an observation.
I’ve been seeing this occurring over the last few years now: The approach of The Txt Generation. Cell phones kept getting cheaper. Parents started buying cell phones for their increasingly younger children. Prepaid phones got cheap. Text messaging with T9-enabled phones grew incredibly popular as it became cheap. Now I’ve even seen “fastest texter” competitions to see who can T9 their way to a grand prize.
It’s sad but hardly surprising then that teens are growing up with text messaging being as common a form of communication as spoken word, and thanks to that damnable T9 system, abbreviations have become the norm because it really is quicker to save typing an extra one or two characters. Unfortunately that seems to be bleeding into their overall language education to the point where they’ve learned to read text message communiques faster and more accurately than the proper written word – and when they are called upon to write anything themselves, it’s peppered with the same short forms.
Every kid should have a Treo.
What’s wrong with T9? The whole point of predictive text is that you can type the whole word now…
Text speak isn’t leet speak
‘This is 133t speak’
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