We couldn't even think of a clever tagline. Move along now. Nothing to see.








As anyone that's been on the 'net long enough knows, there are two standards of English grammar online - the kind used by most people in a civilized society that believes in things like punctuation and refraining from YELLING IN CAPS, the kind that realizes that plurals do not end in "z" - the world where the word "you" is still a three-letter word. (pluralz, u no?)

Then there's Chatspeak. Chatspeak being the portion of the 'net that everyone points to and cites as being the beginning of the end of our society's linguistic evolution. I can't say I'm against that classification, honestly.

In his ongoing endeavor to study strange creatures so that their behaviors can be archived for historical value, Sam attempted to learn Chatspeak one day. However, this proved to be too much of a challenge, even for him, so the Web-Fu Minion turned to what has always served him so well in the past - giant robots, or the closest thing he could find to it.

This week's study in Web-Fu :

Things that cause the de-evolution of the English language and make me fear for the future of our species.

Have you ever felt the need to talk like an idiot from AOL? Admit it, you know you have. You've longed to just hit the Caps Lock key, randomly replace letters with numbers, use inane abbreviations, and throw the rules of grammar to the wind.

WEL NOW U 2 CAN TOK LIEK AN IDIOT WIT TEH AOLSPEAK TRANSLA2R!!!1!1
AOLSPEAK TRANSLA2R

Example:
2-MOROW AND 2-MOROW AND 2-MOROW CREPS IN THIS PETY PAEC FROM DAY 2 DAY 2 DA LAST SYLABL3 OF RACORD3D TIEM AND AL OUR YEST3RDAYS HAEV LIGHTAD TEH WAY 2 DUSTY DEATH!!11 OMG WTF OUT OUT BREIF CANDL3 LIEFS11!1!11! OMG WTF BUT A WOKNG SHADOW A POR PLAEYR TAHT STRUTS AND FR3TS HIS HOUR UPON DA STAEG AND THEN IS HAARD NO MORE IT IS A TAEL 2LD BY AN IDIOT FUL OF SOUND AND FURY SIGNIFYNG NOTHNG 1111111

"OMG WTF OUT OUT BREIF CANDL3" -- How can you beat eloquence like that?
~ Sam
June, 2003

You beat the people that type like this with a club. A very heavy club. Maybe one with a couple of spikes attached to it.
- Claris

~ WebFu Archives