Sunday, September 25, 2005
Is the average 14-18 year old doomed?
Lately, in my never ending quest to expand my horizons and meet some interesting online people, I have stumbled upon some teenagers blogs while looking at various blog rings, particularly the ones that I'm a member of.. Now, I would normally post a link to let you read some of the examples that I've found...but that wouldn't really be right. It would be wrong to single out individuals, when this is a larger issue. Let me use the wonder of Xanga to illustrate what I'm talking about. Xanga, recently added the ability to search all the Xanga sites...post by post, it makes things interesting. So lets do a search for "sup" and "ne1" in a single post. Check out these results:
http://search.xanga.com/searchxanga.aspx?q=sup%20ne1
Now, "ppl" and "pizzed"
http://search.xanga.com/searchxanga.aspx?q=ppl%20%20pizzed
I could go on like this all night, but I think that this illustrates my point. Now, I'll buy the whole Internet lingo which originated to save typing in chat rooms and on IRC is convenient in that sense...where time is of the essence, but to type like that in a post to your blog? So what exactly does that mean?
Well, possibility number one, is that it means that this Internet slang is actually part of this young generations mind now. They subconsciously are able to write ne1, brb, lol, ppl, etc without thinking about it. Are their teachers seeing this on tests and quizzes? If they are asked what the opening of the Declartion of Independence says, does their mind instantly think "We da pp"? How deep does this go. It's really quite frightening. These people aren't stupid or dumb, they are actually probably bright, so they will probably find themselves in college shortly. What are the professors going to say? I know that in some of my classes, I was ripped, and I have pretty good grammar. While I am not one of these English language grammar correcting freaks, I sure as heck pity this Internet generation when they get older!
Now, anyone else ever notice how a lot of people really have trouble with proper grammar and punctuation when they write on a blog? It's as if the shift key and the little punctuation keys would require an exorbitant amount of effort to type. Well, who knows...it just doesn't look good.
Maybe another possibility why these kids do this is that it's "cool" to type like that. Well, that is pretty scary too! If it is cool to post in all Internet lingo, then that means that eventually possibility 2 will come true. What an evil, evil cycle that might be. Am I uncool because I type in complete sentence and don't use a lot of Internet lingo? Is that why I have a lack of high school kids reading my posts?
Possibility 3, these kids actually think that by typing in internet lingo, actually manages to save them a considerable amount of time. Well, I'll buy that they might save a negligible amount of time, but in all honesty, how much are they actually saving? Probably not very much, that is unless the majority of these kids have a faulty pinky fingers and they are unable to reach the SHIFT key when they touch type to use capitals. That could explain a lot...perhaps the pinky in humans is slowly weakening as thumbs grow stronger from video games and typing text on cell phones. Is the humans pinky going to be eliminated by natural selection? Ten million years from now, when the pinky is nothing but a small piece of skin a 1/2" long hanging off the side of our hands with no bones and no muscle, just a little cartilage...will the medical community classify the pinky as in the same class as the appendix and tonsils? Something left over from evolution that now has no purpose?
A couple of weeks ago, I saw someplace an add looking for people with bachelors degrees to grade standardized tests essays. Well, while that may be a little ironic...a standardized essay test (which is a post all by itself) but the thought of grading some teenagers essays was pretty scary. I know that I would have trouble being objective if I actually saw someone write Internet lingo on a test.
Well, enough complaints about youngsters...I'll talk a little bit about my day. I was lazy! Heck yeah...I didn't do anything overly productive. I did try to watch "XXX2: State of the Union" but fell asleep. I might give it another go around, but it didn't seem all that good. I guess the opening sequence just ruined it from the get-go. These super soldier ninja like dudes were invading this underground complex, and place this little 2' diameter mine on the ground. This mine then proceeded to drill down in the ground and into this underground complex. It made a perfect hole that the super-ninja folks could then slide down into. Sorry...but that is a little too far fetched. Then, a few minutes later they talk about their car. A '67 GTO with 1000hp. Sorry...but that's a little out there by itself...but then add the missile launcher on the car and you have something totally in left field.
I know...I'm being too critical of movies. Amanda really hates it when I'm like this. She says I should just watch the darn movie and not try to figure everything out. Sorry...but this just all goes into the reasons why Hollywood is hurting right now. It has nothing to do with movie downloads either. It has to do with too many movies being made and many of these movies being terrible. Movies with scripts this bad would not have been made by a major studio 20 or 30 years ago. The movie would have been made by some low rate studio at the same time they made their other B or C movies.
Whenever I go the the theatre and watch a bad movie it makes me question going to the movies. A trip to the movies is just way too expensive for absolute junk! It's like 8 bucks or more to go a movie, so for the price of two tickets I could either buy the movie when it comes out, or pay for a month of Netflix! Yeah, that's right...Netflix all the way. Thankfully Netflix has saved me from buying these terrible movies. Even better yet, Netflix has saved me from even paying the $4 or whatever it costs to rent a movie. Netflix, you truly earn your keep when it comes to bad movies. That's three movies in a row now...Alexander, Ring2, and now XXX2. So, if you have not tried Netflix do it now and save yourself from supporting the crap the movie industry puts out!
Ok, I'm out!
Lately, in my never ending quest to expand my horizons and meet some interesting online people, I have stumbled upon some teenagers blogs while looking at various blog rings, particularly the ones that I'm a member of.. Now, I would normally post a link to let you read some of the examples that I've found...but that wouldn't really be right. It would be wrong to single out individuals, when this is a larger issue. Let me use the wonder of Xanga to illustrate what I'm talking about. Xanga, recently added the ability to search all the Xanga sites...post by post, it makes things interesting. So lets do a search for "sup" and "ne1" in a single post. Check out these results:
http://search.xanga.com/searchxanga.aspx?q=sup%20ne1
Now, "ppl" and "pizzed"
http://search.xanga.com/searchxanga.aspx?q=ppl%20%20pizzed
I could go on like this all night, but I think that this illustrates my point. Now, I'll buy the whole Internet lingo which originated to save typing in chat rooms and on IRC is convenient in that sense...where time is of the essence, but to type like that in a post to your blog? So what exactly does that mean?
Well, possibility number one, is that it means that this Internet slang is actually part of this young generations mind now. They subconsciously are able to write ne1, brb, lol, ppl, etc without thinking about it. Are their teachers seeing this on tests and quizzes? If they are asked what the opening of the Declartion of Independence says, does their mind instantly think "We da pp"? How deep does this go. It's really quite frightening. These people aren't stupid or dumb, they are actually probably bright, so they will probably find themselves in college shortly. What are the professors going to say? I know that in some of my classes, I was ripped, and I have pretty good grammar. While I am not one of these English language grammar correcting freaks, I sure as heck pity this Internet generation when they get older!
Now, anyone else ever notice how a lot of people really have trouble with proper grammar and punctuation when they write on a blog? It's as if the shift key and the little punctuation keys would require an exorbitant amount of effort to type. Well, who knows...it just doesn't look good.
Maybe another possibility why these kids do this is that it's "cool" to type like that. Well, that is pretty scary too! If it is cool to post in all Internet lingo, then that means that eventually possibility 2 will come true. What an evil, evil cycle that might be. Am I uncool because I type in complete sentence and don't use a lot of Internet lingo? Is that why I have a lack of high school kids reading my posts?
Possibility 3, these kids actually think that by typing in internet lingo, actually manages to save them a considerable amount of time. Well, I'll buy that they might save a negligible amount of time, but in all honesty, how much are they actually saving? Probably not very much, that is unless the majority of these kids have a faulty pinky fingers and they are unable to reach the SHIFT key when they touch type to use capitals. That could explain a lot...perhaps the pinky in humans is slowly weakening as thumbs grow stronger from video games and typing text on cell phones. Is the humans pinky going to be eliminated by natural selection? Ten million years from now, when the pinky is nothing but a small piece of skin a 1/2" long hanging off the side of our hands with no bones and no muscle, just a little cartilage...will the medical community classify the pinky as in the same class as the appendix and tonsils? Something left over from evolution that now has no purpose?
A couple of weeks ago, I saw someplace an add looking for people with bachelors degrees to grade standardized tests essays. Well, while that may be a little ironic...a standardized essay test (which is a post all by itself) but the thought of grading some teenagers essays was pretty scary. I know that I would have trouble being objective if I actually saw someone write Internet lingo on a test.
Well, enough complaints about youngsters...I'll talk a little bit about my day. I was lazy! Heck yeah...I didn't do anything overly productive. I did try to watch "XXX2: State of the Union" but fell asleep. I might give it another go around, but it didn't seem all that good. I guess the opening sequence just ruined it from the get-go. These super soldier ninja like dudes were invading this underground complex, and place this little 2' diameter mine on the ground. This mine then proceeded to drill down in the ground and into this underground complex. It made a perfect hole that the super-ninja folks could then slide down into. Sorry...but that is a little too far fetched. Then, a few minutes later they talk about their car. A '67 GTO with 1000hp. Sorry...but that's a little out there by itself...but then add the missile launcher on the car and you have something totally in left field.
I know...I'm being too critical of movies. Amanda really hates it when I'm like this. She says I should just watch the darn movie and not try to figure everything out. Sorry...but this just all goes into the reasons why Hollywood is hurting right now. It has nothing to do with movie downloads either. It has to do with too many movies being made and many of these movies being terrible. Movies with scripts this bad would not have been made by a major studio 20 or 30 years ago. The movie would have been made by some low rate studio at the same time they made their other B or C movies.
Whenever I go the the theatre and watch a bad movie it makes me question going to the movies. A trip to the movies is just way too expensive for absolute junk! It's like 8 bucks or more to go a movie, so for the price of two tickets I could either buy the movie when it comes out, or pay for a month of Netflix! Yeah, that's right...Netflix all the way. Thankfully Netflix has saved me from buying these terrible movies. Even better yet, Netflix has saved me from even paying the $4 or whatever it costs to rent a movie. Netflix, you truly earn your keep when it comes to bad movies. That's three movies in a row now...Alexander, Ring2, and now XXX2. So, if you have not tried Netflix do it now and save yourself from supporting the crap the movie industry puts out!
Ok, I'm out!
