by Jamie Elizabeth

Created on: January 08, 2010

The internet has introduced entire new methods of communication to the entire world. It allows people to communicate instantly with the touch of a few keys. Because of the instant gratification allowed by internet communication, speed has become the main aspect of communication rather than the quality of the written words within the communication. As a result, the spelling and grammar on nearly all internet postings is completely lacking in proper English grammar.

The internet also allows for a large degree of anonymity, especially when posting comments on online articles, blogs, social media sites, or message boards. People are not concerned with how others will perceive them based on their writing, then, if they are merely an anonymous screen name to those who are reading what they have posted on the internet.

Internet postings are also largely dependent on abbreviations, acronyms, and emoticons. All of these new aspects of language allow writers to convey information without accurately spelling words, or even so much as forming a complete sentence. In order to convey sarcasm, one can simply type a winky face using a semi-colon and a paranthesis, rather then properly forming a sentence to convey the intended effect. Acronyms such as ‘LOL’ and ‘ROFL’ have replaced sentences such as ‘Your comment was very funny and I literally laughed to myself while reading it.’

There is now an entire generation of internet users who have not known a world without the internet. This generation not only writes acronyms such as ‘LOL,’ but speak them in casual conversation. As the generation that has grown up with the internet is also one of the most prolific groups of users of sites such as Facebook and other websites that have ample opportunity to leave postings, the high volume of such postings means that the spelling and grammar of a vast majority of them will be very poor.

The internet is a great tool for communication, and as it is becoming more widely available across the world every day there is more opportunity for people to post and read messages on the internet. People want to be able to write and read these messages as quickly as possible, so that leaves little time for properly constructing a sentence, never mind editing a message once you have written it. Spelling and grammar are often not high on the priority list of people who regularly post on the internet, and it is acceptable for the spelling and grammar to be poor, leading to a huge number of grammatically incorrect poorly spelled postings on the internet.

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