Short & Sweet?

Six degrees of separation. Or was it seven? Anyway a smaller world … with a shorter temper … and a whole new short form lingo. This blog was prompted by a friend who had a funny experience. He works for HP and was talking to a prospective landlord:

Landlord: Where do you work?
My friend: HP
Landlord: Oh nice, my son works there.
My friend: (In the hope of a discount on the deposit) Really? I just joined.
Landlord: Good good. Hope you people can do something about petrol prices.
My friend: Umm … Hmm … (Trying very hard to make the link)
Landlord: Where did you get your degree?
My friend: Blah Blah Institute of Technolgy.
Landlord: What do they teach you about oil there?
My friend: (thinking the house might not be worth it) Nothing.
Landlord: Then how did you get into HP.
My friend: (Blink Blink) I work for Hewlett Packard, not Hindustan Petroleum.

The point is that acronyms have become part of standard conversation and their usage has been boosted by SMS lingo – BRB, TTYL, BFN and other such short-forms that are harder to crack than hieroglyphics.

Names of companies: Understandably, Johnson & Johnson is JNJ and Bharat Heavy Electricals is BHEL, but Infosys to Infy?

Names of people: Leaves me wondering why parents bother with names at all when I hear the likes of SRK, JLo, Bebo, Chi Chi and K-Fed to name a few.

But when I hear objects being abbreviated, I lose all hope for the language - CalC, Ciggy, Undie, Mobike.

Do people not have time to finish a word, leave alone a sentence?
Maybe you don’t have time to finish reading this post.
Maybe it is all a bunch of BS anyway.

6 comments:

S said...

it's not ALL BS i say. the other day my sister said "m doin fyn." grrrrr...really ticks me off! and the new generation uses some strange lingo that was used only by african americans till now. my becomes ma (for heaven's sake) sister become sistah (o c'mon). but some are are ok, don't you think? undies and some p. and cal c.?

just testing waters. relax!

ghetufool said...

good observation. i was at my wits end wheen somebody abbreviated my name, 'anu...,' saala MC.

Ace of Spades said...

@ anu - :) man even 4 letters is too long now?

@ sayantani - pls refrain from phrases like "the new generation." i prefer to let it slip in unnoticed ;)

Shuv said...

didnt it all start with the 'aantels' in 'cal'?

Ace of Spades said...

did it? i thot "aantels" just put on glasses and blew smoke rings with a lost look in their eyes
maybe thats what they were thinking about - a world bought closer through a new language

Vivek Abraham said...

You got a good point there! people are in to much of a hurry! most of whats important is skipped by!

As a blogger it means you r audience understands half of what your trying to say!:)