Internet acronyms -What do they mean and when to use them
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Having been chatting on the net for a long time, I use internet acronyms in most of my day-day conversations over instant messengers (IMs). When you get used to them they're massive timesavers but before then it must seem like they're leaving out a lot of letters -producing gobbledy goop! Although some acronyms are phonetically based, many are are not and often confusing, so sparked by a number of people new to IMs constantly stopping me and asking what it meant (so not making it a timesaver at all while I either typed it out or found a dictionary of acronyms) I decided I would overview a list of acronyms that I use on a regular occasion as a reference point, I may add more later and I hope its of use to someone else out there (please note some of these are just ones that I've made up/use to aid development talk).
General
gtg Got To Go brb Be Right Back (less than 5mins) bbiab Be Back In A Bit (5 - 15mins) bbiaw Be Back In A While (15mins +) b Back wb Welcome Back ty Thank You yw You're Welcome. atm At The Moment ttyl Talk To You Later styl Speak To You Later cya See You cu See You afaik As Far As I Know afaiaa As Far As I Am Aware afaiac As Far As I'm Concerned afaics As Far As I Can See afaict As Far As I Can Tell b/c Because w/ With w/o WithOut g/f GirlFriend b/f BoyFriend gl Good Luck omg Oh My God faq Frequently Asked Question(s) nm Never Mind n1 Nice One n2s Needless To Say nn Night Night n00b A inexperienced and / or ignorant or unskilled person (especially used in computer games) nmp Not My Problem nmj Not My Job pwned Beating / Defeating / Outclassing someone lol Laugh(ing) Out Loud k Ok btw By The Way lmao Laugh(ing) My Ass Off wrt With Regards To
Ones I don't tend to use but I frequently see
wtf What The F*** wth What The Hell fo F*** Off fk F*** Knows fa F*** All sfa Sweet F*** All ffs For F***'s Sake poP*** Off
Technical
w/sWeb Service seSearch EngineseoSearch Engine Optimisation
Smileys
:) Smiley / Happy :D Mega Happy :( Sad ;) Winking :P Sticking Toungue Out :o Surprised :| Disappointed :S Confused / Worried :# Don't Tell Anyone :'( Crying >:( Annoyed :@ Angry |-) Sleepy / Tired / Yawning
Actions
When a phrase is contained in <> it generally refers to an action the user is doing
<g> Grin <bg> Big Grin <vbg> Very Big Grin <vbeg> Very Big Evil Grin
When a is contained in >< it means the user is referring to himselfi.e. >Thinks its too late to be writing an article<
It may also be worth checking out: Google as there's many more complete dictionaries out there!