... & oks

Everybody SMSes or texts these days. It's like a whole new other lingo where the English language gets butchered especially by our ignorant youth. I can't even bear to call it a sub-culture where I only see flagrant word homicide. One in particular glares at me every single time; where 'come' becomes 'cum' (do they do it on purpose or are they even aware of the meaning?)

Well the other thing that got me thinking was the use of dots and the permutations of oks.

Do the number of dots used after a word denote a certain tone or emotion? You know, like if you got a reply that said. "It's alright." / "It's alright.." / "It's alright..." Is there something to discern by the number of dots used? With one being most curt and the more dots being more, well, sincere? Or could it be that the more dots used, the more ambiguous the intention? Like there is a hidden subtext. In this instance, as if to say, "It's alright... (...=but...)" I often find myself seeking clarification when I find myself at the end of dots.

"K" / "ok"/ "okay" / "okie" - Right, I understand the need to abbreviate but I can never take it well when I get a "k" reply. For goodness sake...don't bother replying at all. I somehow feel better when I get an "alright" / "sure". Gives me the illusion that the sender made a bit more effort.

But the piece de resistance is when the dots and the oks are used in conjunction. Then "ok.." / "ok..." / "ok...." becomes loaded in increasing degrees.

One should never try to emote with text messages.

As for me, I painstakingly text the words in full most times. Anything less seems sacrilageous.