Comment on Post title lol

cobysev@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

Elder (and just old) millennial here. I remember “lol” became a thing because cell phones became a common thing. Specifically, the old flip phones.

Texting on them was a pain. Imagine having to type words with only a number pad. And you only had a tiny digital screen that could only fit a few words on it. On top of that, we were sometimes charged by the character. Or sometimes by the word. Depended on your service.

Everyone was looking for the shortest way to type words and get their message across. So shortcuts like “lol,” “ily,” “wdym,” etc. became common use. As well as a variety of text emojis like :) :D :P or the fancy Japanese ones: (^^) (--;;) etc.

As someone who spent their childhood with their nose buried in books, it bothered me to see this shorthand English everywhere. It just felt lazy to me. To this day, I’ve never typed “lol” unless I’m talking about the acronym itself.

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