Breaking all the rules

First it was email and text messages. Then it was instant messaging - and now social media. Comunication today is about doing it as quickly as possible and with as little effort as possible. Great. Only problem is, in the process we are giving in to sheer chaos!

Everything I ever thought I knew about proper written communication is questioned on a daily basis in this brave new world. I used to scoff at text speak when I first learned of its existence. To me, 'words' - nay, character arrangements - like l8r, 4get, and m8 were among the most vile assaults on the written word that I had ever witnessed. Soon enough though, it became acceptable to me to replace the occasional 'to' and 'for' with their numerical derivatives in an sms (text message). But never, and I mean *never*, would I be caught using anything as abhorrent as '4m' in place of 'from'. I mean, honestly - "four-m"? WTF!?!

I gave in... just a little. But still, some modicum of order was retained. I still had rules. Human beings need rules. They form a baseline... The measure against which we deduce our level of conformity; our edginess; where we lie on the good-to-bad continuum. The problem comes in when we all have our own rules, and not one universally recognised set of them. Nowhere is this better illustrated than on that most-beloved of social media platforms - Twitter. (God lord, but we're a neurotic bunch! Just rules, principles, and varying degrees of OCD up the wazoo!) And that, dear readers is why I love it so much.

I had a very interesting discussion with two of my fave tweeps today about the use of LOL. Yes, 'LAUGH OUT LOUD'. Well, that's what Urban Dictionary will tell you it means, but don't be fooled. There are infinite nuances to its use. It's more than just an acronym. Depending just on its placement within a phrase, it can also be used to convey sarcasm, narcissism and (apparently) even condescension. Who would have known, huh?

I disagreed with some of those points. I love to LOL. In fact, I'm the self-appointed captain of #TeamLOL. I LOL all over the place. Indiscriminately. And I'm not ashamed. I've even been known to LMAO at times (yes, you read right). But ROFL? ROFL is reserved for very very special circumstances - it's just a rule of  mine. Some people, on the other hand, LOL as often as they ROFL and LMAO even more. They say BRB when they actually won't, and FML when they actually have it pretty good.

Some people break the cardinal (in my opinion) rule of tweeting - going over 140 characters - with that detestable 'twitlonger'. Others' RTing is just all over the place. Disgusting! (I swear sometimes I think all the sickos of the world are congregated on Twitter.)

So much delinquency... But my worst; my absolute worst are those chaos-mongering smart asses who not only break the rules, but think they can just make them all up as they go along.

Who do they think they are?