Number of Posts: 5
Posts 1 - 5
Le point à la fin du SMS: un mauvais signe
(A period at the end of a text: a bad sign)
Newspaper | Le Monde
Date | 5.1.2016
Language | French
Country | France
Topic Tags | abbreviations, misunderstanding, punctuation, spelling, texting, word/writing
Summary | Texting is becoming very popular among younger people who will soon be getting their smartphone transplanted on their hand. The language of texting is "cool", does not necessarily follow traditional rules, uses phonetics and abbreviations. Moreover, to replace the tone of voice and other nonverbal cues that are lacking in writing, people use emoticons. Now, it seems that adding a period at the end of a text can lead to misunderstandings.
Image Description | Photograph of a businessman walking and looking at his phone
Image Tags | male(s), smartphone
Das Schweigen der Emojis
(The Silence of Emojis)
Newspaper | Welt
Date | 12.8.2016
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | email, emojis, misunderstanding, texting
Summary | Our written and computer-mediated communication is requiring more and more non-textual signs. First the likes of this " :-) " came along and now text messages and emails have begun to look like someone spilled colorful candy all over them. Emojis also easily lead to misunderstandings, so the manicure emoji can be misinterpreted as a weird foot by people who are not in the know.
Image Description | N/A
"Die Flut der Zeichen ist enorm"
("The flood of signs is enormous")
Newspaper | Stuttgarter Zeitung
Date | 27.9.2016
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | emojis, misunderstanding, texting
Summary | The production of signs is in a stage of unprecedented proliferation - everyone partakes in textual production online and so the amount of meaningful signs out there is larger than ever. This is quite interesting with respect to emojis because we have only just started coming up with conventions of their use. We are still negotiating how emoji use can be codified. It is common to think, for instance, that a response without emoji to a message with emoji indicates negative feelings.
Image Description | Emojis and hand gestures.
Image Tags | emojis, hand(s), male(s)
To Text or Not to Text: A Dating Conundrum
Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 28.1.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | misunderstanding, texting
Summary | A woman and a man meet, show interest in each other, and go on a date. After that they text for two months without ever seeing each other again face to face. The woman is upset that the man does not aske her out again but she cannot overcome traditional conventions about women not initiating a date. After two months she breaks up the non-relationship by saying that she does not need a penpal. Then the man invites her for dinner and they get married several years after.
Image Description | Illustration of a man and a woman with a giant smartphone separating them and the woman holding a chainsaw.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone
Autocorrect and the Tao of Texting
Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 6.2.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | autocorrect, misunderstanding, texting
Summary | Most people are annoyed by the automatic correction (autocorrect) program installed on their smartphones by default. It changes typos in text messages but often misunderstand's the writer's intention. Autocorrect can feel like an uninvited content sabotage of one's messages. If we however did not have autocorrect, our messages would likely all be mistyped to the degree of non-intellegibility. Autocorrect, through its seeming random misunderstandings opens up opportunities for philosophic though or "gives voice to the voiceless" such as cats or babies playing with phones and autocorrect stepping in to 'translate'. So while autocorrect can be annoying, fun can be had with it as well.
Image Description | Illustration of one of the exemplified autocorrect mishaps: woman reading an autocorrected (visualized) message about a woman having had a bear attack (should have said heart attack).
Image Tags | female(s), smartphone
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