Texting 101

So many of us can understand a text message if it has words like LOL, OMG, JK, and LMAO. These words are part of the texting language. People that are used to texting will most likely understand these abbreviations but grown ups that don't text much won't understand them. This is called the Texting Lingo. We prefer to use abbreviations instead of the whole word because we save time and we fit more information in one text than if we wrote it all out because we only have 160 characters per text. It is something very conveniant when you have a lot to say. There is an abbreviation for a lot of words. For example, to say thank you, you would just write 10Q. They have some really wierd ones such as bye bye ....BIBI. Wierd. Anyways if any of you guys want to catch up on how these abbreviations work you can check this website that I found, it is http://www.netlingo.com/acronyms.php . So yeah check it out, it has a very long list of abbreviations and it will probably have an abbreviation for what you are looking for.
It may not sound like a big deal but it is. We are letting our "Texting Lingo" be used in things other than a text message. We use in everyday sentences with our friends and sometimes even with our parents. Personally I find it better to say JK than to actually say the whole words just kidding. We use words like these in our facebook statuses and thats okay but to use them in our conversation or in our homework assignments is taking it too far. I mean we are allowed to use it in our blogs because we are writing about something from our point of view. There is time to use words like that and a time to use our proper english. It's hard to do this because we have become so accustomed to talk like that everywhere, but we are now College Students and we need to start talking like college students and not saying things like LMAO!

Negative Consequences

So we've talked about how texting is like the awsomest thing that was ever invented but texting also has its negatives aspects  as well. For example it is such a distraction to us! It distracts us when we text in class. We don't pay attention to the lecture or we can't finish our homework because we are texting. We text while we drive and some of us even while in the bathroom or when we shower. A lot of us like to text during diner and our parents get mad at us because it's suppose to be family time and instead we are texting our friends.IT'S AN ADDICTION that is slowly taking over us and it's CRAZY!
We prefer to text instead of having a front to front conversation or a confrontation. People instead of saying what they think or how they feel they say it over a message. If we are angry we take it out on a message and send it to the person who they are angry at. People need to realize that its okay to text for hours but we can't replace having interaction with others. There are people that ask people out over a text, yeah it's cute especially if you are shy person. But don't take it to the extreme either, others prefer to break up over a text message, I mean how lame is that? They don't want to confron the other and tell them that it's not working out. I would call this being a chicken!
Texting can also be used as another form of cheating. Two people can be in the same classroom and they are taking a test and they text each other the answer. That just wouldn't be fair to the other students. Texting in class can also be considered as disrespectful to the professor because they are trying to teach us and instead we the students are texting and thinking about something else. It is understandable that the class may be boring but how would you feel if you were giving a class and everyone were on their phone?

Texting in 2010...

Well I've wrote already before how texting has come a long way and how it has changed. Well there are many positive ways of using texting. For example, when the earthquake hit Haiti in the beginning of the year,  a lot of people helped out in sending help, food, water, and clothing to the devastated country. Others though found other ways to help such as donating money. One way of donating was by sending a text message to a certain number and automatically donating $10. Ways like this have been used now to donate money to foundations faster than making phone calls. It is a pretty easy and convenient way to donate money and lots of other foundations have used this method instead of making a phone call and giving someone their credit card numbers. People now in days prefer not to have to call someone so instead they send a text message to make it faster and simpler. We have even made our own cool texting language! Instead of writing out "Talk to you later" we write TTYL or to "Oh my Gosh" we write OMG! It's pretty cool when you think about it because you don't even need to write out the whole word. It saves you a lot of time.
Another cool thing of texting is that you can receive alerts! For example, here at USF there is an alert called MOBULL, where you sign up and you receive alerts if there is an emergency going on in school so you can always be informed about what is going on.Like if there is a hurricane warning or things like that. For all facebook users you can receive text messages on your phone when someone has commented on your status, messaged you, and or etc. And I'm pretty sure that are many other social networks where you can receive updates through a simple text message. Weekly I receive a bible verse through a text and a daily devotional, so that's how I uses texting to my advantage. It's pretty awsome when you take advantage of the things that are offered through texting.

Phone Call vs. Texting

Do you remember when you used to be on the phone for hours and hours talking to who ever? Now that texting has become so popular less and less people are talking over the phone. People prefer to text conversations for hours or at least I do. Personally I prefer to text for hours instead of talking to someone. Yeah it is sort of a bad thing because you have less interaction with other people but then again it's up to you what you prefer. I hardly ever call anyone well maybe only my parents but even with them I text message them. It's a simpler and easier thing to do especially when you are unable to answer a call, instead you send a text.  Maybe this doesn't relate much but in homes, most people don't even have house phones anymore, well I don't. There was a time when every teenager wanted their own phone in their room and now that is a thing in the pass. Every teenager has a cell phone, EVEN KIDS have phones! We rely on our cell phones so much! We feel so lost when we leave our phones at home or even when we run out of battery on them! It's crazy how sometimes our lives depend on these things! Yeah it is a bit exaggerating but come on it's the truth! But going back to the subject...who makes phone calls anymore??? Phone calls are important too when it is an emergency but like I had said we prefer to text. There are statistics that show that that s teenager will sent an average of about 2272 text messages per month and will only make about 200 calls that month. And nationally about 75 billion text messages are sent in a year! Well we can see hear what teens prefer to do, it is a pretty high number of texters.

DWT?? (Driving while Texting)

How many of us have texted while driving? I bet we all do it! I do it all the time. Our parents, older people, and even tv commercials always tell us to not text and drive. But how many of us actually listen to them? I guess it's easy for us to say that we are always careful when we text and drive. But what would happen if for responding to a text one day and we don't see a stop sign or a stop light and we cause an accident that hurts us or hurts someone else. I guess it doesn't really affect us when it doesn't happen to us. And hopefully it never does happen to us. I mean living with the guilt that you hurt someone or even worst, killed them.
We've seen many news stories of accidents on tv from results of texting. We've even seen the commercials of the lawyers saying they are mad cause of a texting while driving accident. But does that stop us from doing it?  We need to be careful while driving because we can hurt so many people with our carelessness.
Texting while driving has been banned in about 20 states now. And many people are working on making it a state law in all of the United States. Though I doubt that that has really stopped many people from doing it. People would think that only teenagers and young adults do it but surprisingly older people have been texting more and more while driving. But we should not be part of this crowd who does this or part of the statistics of texters and drivers. We need to control the urge of texting while behind the wheel. If we get a text then we should wait until we arrive to our destination, pull over, or at least wait until a red light. I guess something that helps me from not texting is that I don't have a car on campus so I don't worry much about that and even when I go home on the weekends I don't drive much.

iPods => Texting too!

So I recently bought a new iPod this week and I love it! I can do basically everything there that I would do on my phone. In my first blog I said how iPods now have free texting apps. So the other day I was looking at all the free apps that come with the iPod and one of them is the free texting. You get your own phone number and everything. You can even send pictures too! I thought this was just amazing because I text on that and not on my phone anymore. Something like this would make you think wow why do we need phones anymore! Although my blogs aren't about phones, I think they are still important because they relate to texting and they are what we text on. Okay anyways, I am still amazed at how one day I am so attached to my phone and then the next day I'm not! You can do a lot of things on the new iPods that you can do on your phone as well! More and more people prefer to buy an iPod than a cell phone because new stuff is always being added to the new generations of iPods. And now these iPods have video calling too, a thing that some cell phones don't even have, well just the iPhone. This is possible through the camera that is now included. I'm just waiting now for an iPod to come out with an app that can make phone calls. Well actually that would be pretty cool and I'd definetly buy one. I mean you can download music, movies, and even books on an iPod. Apple is coming out with new stuff that I don't even know if we are ready for yet. Technology is rapidly growing and who knows what else will be available to us pretty soon. Texting was probably the first thing that amazed me on this gadget and I still got to keep exploring it and see what else I will find. I believe that this whole amazement of the iPods does not only happen to me but to everyone else that buys it.

Texting in class??

So I guess we have established that I'm the kind of person who loves to text and that there are many others that do too. Well back in high school the administrators would always tell us that all electronic devices were prohibited. But did that really ever stop us from taking out our phones during class? The worst that they could do to us if we were caught is give us a referral or take our phones away and have our parents come and pick it up at school. But even after that we will keep texting. Texting is like a disease that has taken over us and we have lost control. We have come up with slick moves when we hide our texting. The one I would use is putting my back pack on the floor and having it open with my cell phone on the bottom so I could see when I get a text cause the light would flash and I would reach down and pretend to look for something and instead I'd be texting back. Another thing we do is put the phone under our desk and since we have memorized the keypad, it would be easier to text back without getting caught. Now we are college students and no longer high school students but some of our texting habits stay with us. Although a lot of our professors don't actually say that we are not allowed to text during class I guess you can say that they assume that we shouldn't. We have realized that there are some buildings that have no signal for our phones and we could probably say that they did that for a reason. Mrs. Sarah has said to us straight up that she does not want us to be texting during class and I personally am scared to ever take my phone out in her presence. But should we really have to be told to not text during class? I think now that we are in college we should try to control our urge of texting someone during class and put our phone somewhere that we cannot be looking at it every minute. This is a very hard task to do but not impossible. This can sound pretty funny to some people but this is what texting really does to us. I'm working on not texting during my professors lectures because some of the lectures are pretty long and boring so I usually take out my phone and start texting someone.