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Instant Messaging Shortcuts

Communication through Internet has become a primary way to keep in touch with near and dear ones. Young people mostly use instant messaging shortcuts. Though it will be unfair to discriminate the usage of instant messaging shortcuts in such a manner.
Instant messaging shortcuts are mostly used to save time. It also help to communicate with many people at a limited time. It is useful in on line chatting. It is mostly used by youngsters in chat rooms. It is also commonly used in e-mails, on line discussion forum, instant messaging and in text messaging by cell phone users.

Using chat abbreviations in a text conversation on Internet is very simple. It is usually put in the middle of a sentence or is used separately. For example, on reading a funny joke while interacting with a friend over the Internet, you can convey your emotion by writing LOL. LOL stands for Laugh Out Loud. You can use various emoticons to express your feeling.

Some of the commonly used chat acronyms are ASAP(As Soon As Possible), AFAIK (As Far As I Know), LOL (Laugh Out Loud), BBL (Be Back Later), CYA(See Ya), OMG (Oh My God), BBS (Be Back Soon or Bulletin Board System), TTFN (Ta-Ta For Now), JK (Just Kidding), LYL (Love You Lots), TTYS (Talk To You Soon), SN(Screen Name or So Nyah), GTG (Got To Go) and many more.

Some Internet websites also offer chat acronym dictionary where from you can understand what the chat abbreviations actually mean. It is interesting to note that parents often search the Internet to decipher the actual meaning of a sentence written in abbreviated way by their kids. One such website where you can search for instant messaging shortcuts is teenchatdecoder.com.

Everyday new instant messaging shortcuts are created which adds up to the list. While chatting with friends the youngsters fuse different chat shortcuts in an interesting and clever way.

Some teachers and parents feels that because of the rampant usage of chat acronyms it is degrading the method of communication of the recent generations. It is also hampering the grammatical skills of the younger generation because the instant messaging shortcuts do not comply to any sentence syntax. For example, BBL stands for “Be Back Later” clearly shows the syntactical error of the phrase.

But some recent surveys carried out in United Sates of America and Canada have given a different opinion. The reports that have been submitted shows that it is in contrast to the popular belief that these chat shortcuts are killing the quality of language. The research was carried out on 71 teenagers. It showed that the young boys and girls have a strong command over the language.