The Forums: Summary via LOTROcat

[taoteron]

What is Gramzor?

_______________________

Oh...and I'm just having fun.

Nothing I said was directed at you. I am sorry that you took it personally. I DO take offense and hold in contempt that things like this seem to be creating an entire generation of idiots. SEEM to be...not ARE. MY opinion as a business owner who cannot find anyone who can handle even the most menial of tasks who carry this phenomenon into every day real life.

Again, I'm sorry I got your panties in a bunch. Carry on. I'll avert my eyes.

[Melissaissim]

Teh anouncemint maked by teh Turbine Hoomans gives +10 hope.
We iz so exciting to here abouts teh nu classes, moar charektor slots en HUGEmungus nu area!!

[Caelven]

<removed by author>

[Des1]

Language is an evolving thing. Caelven put a quote in there from Alexander Gill, stressing Chaucers use of French.. I now, as an example, give you a bit of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales":


Whilom, as olde stories tellen us,
Ther was a duc that highte Theseus;
Of Atthenes he was lord and governour,
And in his tyme swich a conquerour,
That gretter was ther noon under the sonne.
Ful many a riche contree hadde he wonne,
What with his wysdom and his chivalrie;
He conquered al the regne of Femenye,
That whilom was ycleped Scithia,
And weddede the queene Ypolita,
And broghte hir hoom with hym in his contree,
With muchel glorie and greet solempnytee,
And eek hir yonge suster Emelye.
And thus with victorie and with melodye
Lete I this noble duc to Atthenes ryde,
And al his hoost, in armes hym bisyde.

I like that passage. Its one of my favorites.

Mebbe we should have LOTROMEcats ???

[acernate]

At least the kitteh pidgin is easier to understand.

[maxmckay]

Dear Fun Killer,
Is it painful to you to watch others having fun? Does the fact that I am easily amused offend? Would it shock you to know that I am responsible for the marketing material for the company that I work for? Are you surprised that my way with words and my ability to convey ideas in written, oral and indeed macro or meme* format is partly responsible for paying my bills? [As a side note, I do have other sundry duties. The titles of Head Geek and Goddess of Servers would be appropriate. Not to mention that my ninja abilities are sometimes used for political assassinations.] Is it not interesting that the marketing jargon used above specifically relates to the types of cultural evolution which this thread represents? Are you impressed that thus far all my question marks are in their proper place? Your inference that my silly thread has a negative affect on the English language is laughable. I should suggest that you recall that the English language has evolved and will continue to evolve. However, I highly doubt that l3et speak or kitteh pidgin embodies the English of the future. It is entirely possible that a phrase or two will make its way into popular culture (beyond net culture) and stick around for a few years. "DO NOT WANT" is featured on T-shirts from thinkgeek.com, but I digress. May I extrapolate here, that the fact things are misspelled is what makes it funny, and if it was not funny no one would read it? If others had not read it, laughed and asked for more, then you good sir would not have read it either. Therefore, you would not have had the chance to appreciate my ability to use proper grammar and punctuation. As a result, this thread would have even less meaning than it does currently. Now that I have got all that off my chest I will continue with the purpose of this thread, making people laugh (or at least smile). Unfortunately, your posts did not do either for me...

*meme: (pron. 'meem') A contagious idea that replicates like a virus, passed on from mind to mind. Memes function the same way genes and viruses do, propagating through communication networks and face-to-face contact between people. The root of the word "memetics," a field of study which postulates that the meme is the basic unit of cultural evolution. Examples of memes include melodies, icons, fashion statements and phrases.

nicely stated and well thought out. I think some here are crying fire just because they see a small candle.

btw Keep the pictures coming! there are many of us here who do understand that this is humor and take it as such

[Dinara]

Indeed!

I have both dogs and cats and I love this thread!
And I will add that neigther the dogs nor the cats get upset when I read and laugh at this thread!

[Voxin]

I don't think that it is laughable, in fact, I don't think about it at all. Those who know the language well see no problem with having fun with it, those who do not know the language well see the rules. If they knew the sources of many of those rules they would be really embarrassed that they had ever taken stock in them.

<snip>

I found Taoteron's remarks to be little more than an agenda driven rant, out of place and absurd given the context of the thread. Had anything in this thread been a serious attempt to communicate complicated ideas or make a case for anything important, a criticism of prose may have been warranted. Complaining that cats -- who, last I checked, are not native English speakers -- are using "kitteh pidgin," and not proper English, is as ludicrous as it would be for someone to object to the idea that kittens could use computers. The kitteh-speak, like their expertise in a computer game, is part of the humor, and it is, itself, actually poking fun at the language errors. That makes the link to the Ebonics issue (a valid point in a different context) truly silly.

That said, I cannot agree with the above, either. It suggests that those who view the rules of language as important are mere "posers" who do not really understand. False reliance on the rules (or reliance on urban-myth kind of rules) can, indeed, produce ludicrous results. For instance, someone once criticized Churchill for using prepositions at the end of a sentence, and he is reported to have replied that this was the kind of criticism "up with which I will not put." On the other hand, just because the language actually does allow prepositions at the end of a sentence does not mean that a dangling preposition is not a grammatical error. There are instances where it creates confusion. So suggesting that people who point to the rules simply do not understand is ludicrous.

Rules help clarify communications. Take for instance your third sentence above. You have an introductory conditional clause modifying the verb later in the sentence. Punctuation rules require a comma between "rules" and "they" so that people pause and know that "rules" ends the condition and "they" begins the main thought. The missing comma forces them to needlessly reread the sentence to determine what you are saying. The same can be said of your first sentence because it is missing a period or a conjunction in the middle; thus, you are not really sure if "in fact" is modifying the first part of the sentence or the second (or more accurately, with the first sentence or the sentence that runs-on with the first because of a punctuation error).

Please understand, these are not personal criticisms. We all write fast in this format, and we all make mistakes we may not normally make. For instance, Melissaissim could have separated her well thought-out defence of her literacy into one or two more paragraphs, and Taoteron’s post complaining that the lack of punctuation (among other things) makes things hard to understand contained missing punctuation. I am even fairly certain that, despite my careful attempt to avoid it, there will be errors in this reply. Mistakes happen. However, to suggest that the rules are little more than recommendations and that pointing them out is indicative of a lack of understanding is a bit silly as well. Taoteron's remarks were out of line because they failed to take into account the context of the thread. However, so is the apparent suggestion that rules do not matter. They are there for a reason.

In fact, that is the one thing I would remind people making the humorous posts here. You are already butchering language (for a reason). While that makes for good humor, you do have to take care not to mangle the words so much that people cannot determine what word is being mangled. I say this because there have been a few posts that I have had to reread a few times just to figure out what the real word was, and there is probably at least one post I never did figure out. A comedian once quipped to his audience, "Listen folks, it's no good if I have to explain these [jokes]." The same advice should be remembered here. You understand what words you are intentionally misspelling. Your audience, however, does not necessarily know where you are going with the joke. That means that they may need the words to understand the context, which they may not be able to determine without the context to decipher the words. So keep up the good work, but take care not to forget that you are still communicating, so don’t take a good thing too far.

Sorry for hijacking the thread with this and for the length of the reply. This thread is delightful, and it should not have to be marred by debates about language. So I will keep my opinions to myself hereafter.

[taoteron]

OK....

I have no agenda. Simply put, I came in here, was very confused as this was the first time I'd seen anything of this nature and after reading all of the posts I understood why I see things like 'teh' and 'skoolz' on job applications. In a light way, with my cat as a scapegoat, (I do understand that cats cannot type, nor do they speak English very well) I tried to explain that maybe, sometimes, people cannot see past themselves and that certain little 'fun' things can sometimes leak into the culture of our society and have results that are less than favorable.

I am not an English Nazi. I own a collection of books that are older that The United States. I understand that the language evolves. I am not an English major. Sometimes my speeling is atroshus.

I was simply trying to make light out of a situation which concerned me at first glance and attempted to show it from another viewpoint that other may have not, nor ever have, seen as we are sometimes blind to things outside of what is within our pleasure zone, and accountability in our society has become nil.

I should have known better.

Please, do not expend any more energy diverting this post away from it's original intent. I made a mistake in speaking what I felt and the thread should not have to suffer for it.

I bid you adieu so that I may go tell another dozen people dat dey r umemployablz.

[Amonceleb]

OK....

I have no agenda. Simply put, I came in here, was very confused as this was the first time I'd seen anything of this nature and after reading all of the posts I understood why I see things like 'teh' and 'skoolz' on job applications. In a light way, with my cat as a scapegoat, (I do understand that cats cannot type, nor do they speak English very well) I tried to explain that maybe, sometimes, people cannot see past themselves and that certain little 'fun' things can sometimes leak into the culture of our society and have results that are less than favorable.

I am not an English Nazi. I own a collection of books that are older that The United States. I understand that the language evolves. I am not an English major. Sometimes my speeling is atroshus.

I was simply trying to make light out of a situation which concerned me at first glance and attempted to show it from another viewpoint that other may have not, nor ever have, seen as we are sometimes blind to things outside of what is within our pleasure zone, and accountability in our society has become nil.

I should have known better.

Please, do not expend any more energy diverting this post away from it's original intent. I made a mistake in speaking what I felt and the thread should not have to suffer for it.

I bid you adieu so that I may go tell another dozen people dat dey r umemployablz.

I basically agree with you about the general lack of proper grammar, good diction, etc., particularly in the professional and academic worlds.

Sometimes you have to pick your battles. A hiring seminar might be a good venue to pitch the cause. A light-hearted thread in a gaming community forum...not so much. Just something to think on.

[HDiver]

Ok, with all that unpleasantness out of the way, let's see more kittehz!

I'm stuck at work on Good Friday (The first time we haven't been given this day as a holiday) and I miss the pics in this thread. I've already checked out http://www.icanhascheezburger.com for the day and not much new there either.

[Doronlas]

[patricles43]

NOOOOO!!!!!! SOMEONE GET THE POPE ON THE PHONE!!! SAY IT AIN'T SO!!!!
http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/popculture/a359/zoom/

[Tairii]

NOOOOO!!!!!! SOMEONE GET THE POPE ON THE PHONE!!! SAY IT AIN'T SO!!!!
http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/popculture/a359/zoom/

DO NOT WANT

[taoteron]

NOOOOO!!!!!! SOMEONE GET THE POPE ON THE PHONE!!! SAY IT AIN'T SO!!!!
http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/popculture/a359/zoom/

MINE! lmao

[HavelockVetinari]

[Melissaissim]

Sorries for teh tangents....

notice teh kitteh is in teh rubarb plant? Tell him to picks it, worth 12 copperz

OkOKOK
MOAR LOTROcats u can haz!
Most teh craften fings u hear on teh forums is complaner about teh crit chance. Sum complaner about teh shard fingys too. I understoodz dis part cuz its much difficultz to find dem. Teh Turbine Hoomans maked it harder to camp, but teh problem is not fixed nao teh randum drops are bery rare en teh evell gold farmers haz much paycents to finds or farms dem.

I here sum angries people liek dis:



sum peoples are full of charm liek dis:



sum peoples are vigelaunty liek dis:

[Imara]

Hahaha I have to admit this summed up all of my feelings on Evendim! It seriously had me cackling.

[hellybellybuny]

Dear Fun Killer,
Is it painful to you to watch others having fun? Does the fact that I am easily amused offend? Would it shock you to know that I am responsible for the marketing material for the company that I work for? Are you surprised that my way with words and my ability to convey ideas in written, oral and indeed macro or meme* format is partly responsible for paying my bills? [As a side note, I do have other sundry duties. The titles of Head Geek and Goddess of Servers would be appropriate. Not to mention that my ninja abilities are sometimes used for political assassinations.] Is it not interesting that the marketing jargon used above specifically relates to the types of cultural evolution which this thread represents? Are you impressed that thus far all my question marks are in their proper place? Your inference that my silly thread has a negative affect on the English language is laughable. I should suggest that you recall that the English language has evolved and will continue to evolve. However, I highly doubt that l3et speak or kitteh pidgin embodies the English of the future. It is entirely possible that a phrase or two will make its way into popular culture (beyond net culture) and stick around for a few years. "DO NOT WANT" is featured on T-shirts from thinkgeek.com, but I digress. May I extrapolate here, that the fact things are misspelled is what makes it funny, and if it was not funny no one would read it? If others had not read it, laughed and asked for more, then you good sir would not have read it either. Therefore, you would not have had the chance to appreciate my ability to use proper grammar and punctuation. As a result, this thread would have even less meaning than it does currently. Now that I have got all that off my chest I will continue with the purpose of this thread, making people laugh (or at least smile). Unfortunately, your posts did not do either for me...

*meme: (pron. 'meem') A contagious idea that replicates like a virus, passed on from mind to mind. Memes function the same way genes and viruses do, propagating through communication networks and face-to-face contact between people. The root of the word "memetics," a field of study which postulates that the meme is the basic unit of cultural evolution. Examples of memes include melodies, icons, fashion statements and phrases.

aww i <3 you server goddess and lotro cat guru! =)

[Lohi]

I am not an English major. Sometimes my speeling is atroshus.

The spelling and grammar here is entirely ironic. We're making fun of the decline of language possibly. The language skills of the cats are supposed to be even worse than most vile case of mobile phone texting internet-raised leet-speaker out there. It shouldn't be hard to distinguish those who speak this way as a joke and those who do it naturally (in order to fit in or from skull trauma at an early age). Some players wouldn't see the irony if it showed up on their minimap with mine tracking.

LOTRO is great for having reasonably intelligent talk in chat compared to other games. Though there are exceptions. The other day someone giving advice to a trial account just could not manage to say "you". Everything else he said seemed normal. He even used "uve" which I had never seen before. I was ready to start a rant about it until I realized he was actually helping the other player.

[Melissaissim]

aww i <3 you server goddess and lotro cat guru! =)

I <3 you too!

Enspired bi teh lolcat dat said teh cookie really eated him, teh LOTROcats haz sumting nice to sez about teh craften...

[Melissaissim]

Yes teh kittehs r still maken conversayshun about teh shards...

Dis wittle kitteh went to teh market



Dis wittle kitteh stayed home



Dis wittle kitteh had roast beef



Dis wittle kitteh had none

[Melissaissim]

Dis wittle kitteh went weeee weee wee all teh way home!



Dear Turbines Hoomans,
Pleaze send shards to mah Easter Baskit.
Bery muches fank you!
LUV,
Lotrocats

[SandioTech]

This was a ninja fix! Wasn't in the patch notes... I cry foul!



On the other hand, here's my newest nub creation

[maxmckay]

ahh it's nice to see mah kitties back in action