Chris @ Olstrom (.com)

Language, then, like everything else, gradually transforms itself over the centuries. There is nothing surprising in this. In a world where humans grow old, tadpoles change into frogs, and milk turns into cheese, it would be strange if language alone remained unaltered.

– Jean Atchison, Language Change: Progress or Decay?, p. 4

Many communities have been hit by the plague of idiocy that runs rampant through the pixelated streets of the metaverse. Avatars mangle their speech, and justify it by claiming that it ’saves time’. Perhaps it does, however the half-second one might save is outweighed by the several seconds (or more) that the reader must take to decipher this garbage. The practice of (ab)using netspeak is tremendously selfish.

Assume that a decent post will be read by one hundred people (in reality it will likely be read by many times this, but conservative estimates make for better debates).

Someone having minor experience with keyboards can reach 20 words per minute, an average typist reaches about 30 to 45 (usually the minimum required for dispatch positions and other typing jobs), while advanced typists work at speeds above 60. ^[1]

This means that an inexperienced typist can enter approximately one word every three seconds, an average typist one word every two to 1.3 seconds, and an experienced typist can enter upwards of one word per second.

If the poster reduces their keystrokes per post by 15% by using netspeak (’txt-tlk’) and an average post is 300 characters, or 60 words long (a generous estimate), 45 keystrokes, or 7 words are saved. This translates to the following time savings, based on the skill of the typist:

• Inexperienced, 21 seconds.
• Average, 9.1-14 seconds.
• Experienced, less than 7 seconds.

Educated adults read at 200-350 wpm, at best 400 wpm for full comprehension.^[1]

What impact does netspeak have on reading comprehension? It is hard to say, but if it takes approximately one minute for the average adept reader to read an average post, and we postulate that an additional five seconds of time are required to decipher this mangled syntax, ten readers will consume fifty seconds of time, and one hundred will consume five hundred seconds of otherwise productive time deciphering the post.

• For an inexperienced typist, readers cumulatively waste 23.8 times more time deciphering than the typist saves.
• For an average typist, readers waste 35.7 to 54.9 times the typist’s savings.
• For an experienced typist, readers are required to spend 71.4 times the amount of time the typist saved, deciphering the mangled language.

Please, don’t waste other people’s time.

Citations

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute

This writing was originally featured here, on Gaia Online.

A conversation was raised inquiring as to why one would choose to use a forum, rather than a chat medium such as MSN.

Regarding public discussion

Forums encourage more people to engage in discussion, by exposing the topic of conversation to a wider audience than MSN could target. Allowing for the use of group chats, each person still needs to be invited to participate.

IRC is a bit more suited to public discussion, for similar reasons, but its realtime interaction, rather than persistent nature of the web leads to rapid topic decay. With everything happening live, a given topic may last for a few hours at best on any instant chat medium.

On the web however, a solid topic may generate weeks of discussion, if not more, as users can return to a topic at any time, whenever it is convenient for them to do so. Likewise, new users may jump into an existing discussion, and revive a topic that has not been active in days.

Regarding private discussion

Most forums are platform-neutral. It is no less convenient to chat for a Mac user with Safari, a Windows user with Internet Explorer, or a Linux user with Firefox. Anyone with a browser that supports cookies (and ideally, javascript, Flash, and images for the full experience) can interact.

MSN requires users to use specific software (while there are alternatives to Windows Live Messenger, such as Gaim, these clients often lack all the features of the ‘official’ ones).

Including chat protocols other than MSN, such as ICQ/AIM, Yahoo Messenger, Jabber, or IRC only further widens the rift. If one person uses MSN, and other uses AIM, one or more of them is inconvenienced in the process of creating yet another account for some service, and is burdened with the overhead of one more application running on their system.

For this reason above all else, forums are superior to IM.

This writing was originally featured here, on Gaia Online.

So often we hear this classic metaphor used to describe a person’s outlook on life, or a specific event. More often than not, the outlook being discussed is neatly placed in a box, and attached a tag marking it as pessimistic, or optimistic. Some views however, are not so neatly packaged.

The glass is not half-full, nor is it half-empty. It is in need of a refill.

Rather than accepting events the way they are even when we know that they are not ideal, why not push to improve them? Take action, and ‘refill your glass’ (or the glass of another), so to speak. One could theorize that if enough people adopted this sort of mindset, the world we live in (meatspace, as it were) would be more enjoyable for everyone. Reduced levels of conflict, a stronger sense of community, and a greater sense of trust in those around us. How far-reaching would the effects of this be? The only way to find out is to do it, and see what happens.

This writing was originally featured here, on Gaia Online.

One aspect of the Metaverse that has always charmed me is the astounding level of equality. Here, we are all no more than strings of ones and zeroes. Web services do not distinguish between genders, nationalities, religions, or political viewpoints.

There is a certain level of elitism imposed by certain parts of this world, though. Passwords, subscription-based services, and ranked search results do chip away some of that equality. Service is denied to some not because of ethnicity, or religion, but because they either were unable to, or opted not to buy into a subscription-based offer. Favouritism is imposed with a myriad of search technologies. Some where being the most popular (measured by how many other popular entities talk reference you) brings favourable placement, which entices further referencing. Others being essentially bribe-based. Top ranking goes to the person who pays the most for it. Even passwords put a certain level of restriction on clientele: only those with the secret code phrase can enter, reminiscent of a den of pirates. If you don’t have the password, you are simply not welcome.

This writing was originally featured here, on Gaia Online.