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The internet has a fascinating affect on how people speak English. Whether it's been 1337 5p3ak, truncated words and new phrases borne of phonetical speaking turned into text, or weird ways of punctuation being used mockingly. I wonder if this has happened to other languages as well.

Examples being meme formats with overexagerrated punctuation, words like "prolly" (probably) or such, and even people using unpunctuated, uncapitalized sentences to indicate, say, whispering. I'd love to see the origins of a lot of these weird ways of internet lingo

On the other hand, it's an absolute nightmare to keep track of, and it makes me wonder how many people fail to understand English.

Aside from the issue of truncated words, acronyms, or exaggerated punctuation (these can also be stylistic and carefully crafted innovations), what I criticize most is the laziness and banality in the writing that, in my opinion, reflects a certain lack of care, attention, effort, and precision in the younger generation. A tendency to do things roughly, as they come, without worrying about the results.

(to latest comment)
well, I don't want to sound rude of course, but that sounds exactly like what stereotypical old people say when they complain about newer generations. i think as every generations continue, they grow up in a world full of flaws and therefore passion to fix them, therefore changing the world and showcasing new flaws that might occur.

the younger generation, especially with the help of technology, is doing so many incredible things in art, and stopping exploitation and systems that hurt people. I think as the internet allows so many people to communicate, people have realized there's no reason to follow these arbitrary english rules for a tweet or discord message.

I honestly think people 300 years ago writing in ye ol' english would probably say the same thing you're saying now. the generation before yours might've thought the same thing about your generation.

For my less serious post, I usally do it really sloppy and don't mind much about punctuation, but if I'm doing a comment about a project or if I have a question, I like to take the time to make sure I have proper grammar, even if it's just a sentence or two.

Also, you though here was bad? Just take a look at stan twitter. It's like another language over there, and I'm still trying to learn it.

Well guys, I must admit that this time you have written using correct, clear and understandable english. If you always keep this care for the form, you will get along well with yours truly ....your virtual daddy.

@Jacklack3 I've waited for this kind of reply. "Language changes… there have always been complaints from old…"
Generally a correct statement; but it fails correctly describing written language is (ab)used. Basic spelling/grammar/punctuation are needed for readability and understanding – not talking about the level good writers (journalists, authors) should aim for (free of errors).

I think this is the most important for English, especially on international platforms like this one. A native speaker might easily understand some abbreviations, more than a bit deviating from rules, strange terms that can't be found in the dictionary. Somebody having learned English in school will have a hard time – I know from own experience.

When it comes to my mother tongue – German – I could cry! I have read classifieds which required reading the “words” aloud to guess the meaning from the sound. No, not an exaggeration.

Hearing teenagers on the bus having an active vocabulary of the size what seems than less than 500 words hurts. When it comes to talking to them for whatever reason, they seem to be unable to understand me.

Seems their passive vocabulary is tiny as well.

Unfortunately this is not even limited to very young people having not finished their education. We have an increasing number of (functional and total) illiterates. The possibility to “express” oneself in hieroglyphs (emojis, memes) surely doesn’t anything to improve the situation.

@KleinesSinchen

people's lower usage of punctuation over the years isn't exactly a perfect statement you can look at. sure, a lot of people don't use much punctuation nowadays, but back then you also didn't have the internet. you didn't have texting or forums.

instead you might've had to use letters, which took a long time to communicate with, so it would make sense to use proper english rules. but at an age where people can have an hour long conversation in just text, it doesn't make sense why the entire time you have to use these arbitrary rules.

and it's not like you've stopped using a letter of the alphabet, directly getting in the way of communicating what you want. people stop using certain english rules in these cases because they can, they're able to without things getting confusing.

another thing is perhaps a lot of people in general have had troubles with language, and it's only now that everyone has a voice that we can see that. also emojis aren't even really used exclusively. the closest thing is using it to describe a joke, or communicate sarcasm or whatever. and memes aren't used as communication??

"also emojis aren't even really used exclusively" I've seen it. Messages consisting solely(!) of emojis.
"and memes aren't used as communication??" They are! Meme-only replies(?) are unfortunately a thing as well. The question is if this is a valid way of communication (would negate this).

A good part of the decline/degeneration of written language appeared with technical constraints ("SMS"). Typing on a non-T9 phone paying money for every 140 characters asked for creative solutions. Part of this problem can be seen in GBAtemp profile messages with the 420 char limit. The above four messages took me half an hour. They sound a bit weird because of trying to stay within the limit.

Even though some problems are solved, some problems still exist: Even trained, talented people often rely on auto-correct when writing on their smartphones and will rather keep messages short and not invest time to craft their texts. A proper keyboard makes this easier.