First things first, I’m a huge Words With Friends fan, thus the Alec Baldwin reference. But my Words With Friends obsession has more to do with what texting and tweeting have done to our language than whatever it is that fuels Mr. Baldwin’s triple word score mania.
Simply put, I’m appalled at what texting and tweeting have done to spelling. Yup, spelling. Thanks to Twitter’s 140-character shackles and the sheer speed at which we text, letters deemed unnecessary are dropped willy-nilly.
Later becomes “ltr”. See you soon, “c u soon”. How are you, “how r u”. And so on.
Words With Friends , or “WWF” in the Twittersphere (World Wrestling Federation?), on the other hand, resurrects those once-discarded letters. “Ltr” isn’t legal in Words With Friends. Neither is “plz”. Nor is “txt”. In fact Words With Friends doesn’t just force players to spell correctly, it rewards them for doing so. After all, the more letters you use, the more points you accumulate.
And for that, for turning Words With Friends into a must-have for millions, I want to say thanks, Alec.
Not “thnx”…but a real, old-fashioned, six-letter, 39-point triple word score thanks.
Law of unintended consequences. Positive for once.
actually,
later = l8r
thanks = thx
bcnu!