Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 3
Posts 1 - 3

I can't be trusted with Google's texting app

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Newspaper | Telegraph
Date | 19.5.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Google, language threat, texting, word/writing, youth
Summary | Google's new Allo app is supposed to make you save time while you're texing, but it can sometimes lead to misunderstandings. The author of the article doesn't really like emojis and doesn't know how to use them well. She doesn't follow young people's digital habits. Their generation favors brevity, which can have a negative impact on language.
Image Description | Photograph of two young girls on their smartphones, two smartphones displaying chat conversations, and a man standing in front of a screen displaying "Allo" and "Duo".
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone, text

Elf neue Wörter, die wir dringend brauchen

(Eleven new words that we need urgently)

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Newspaper | Welt
Date | 1.9.2016
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | (mental) health, smartphone, word/writing
Summary | Our language cannot keep up with technological innovations and other changes. There are dozens of new scenarios that have no name and urgently need one. For instance the shame parents feel when their children join an idiotic fad like Pokémon Go or the neck deformation our generation will have from staring at a smartphone all our lives. Another discrepancy is that we have no catchy name for involuntary images taken of floors or the insides of our pockets. We also new words to describe intersex people or stretched out ears after a lifetime of ear-gaging.
Image Description | Getty Images of a woman with ear gages and a transgender person.
Image Tags | computer/laptop, female(s), male(s), smartphone

Schriftliche Forschheiten: Vom Niedergang der Höflichkeit

(Written briskness: On the demise of politeness)

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Newspaper | Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ)
Date | 1.9.2014
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | email, language threat, politeness, school, texting, WhatsApp, word/writing
Summary | Communication researchers agree that politeness in professional writing has decreased with the rise of digital communication. Rules of formal writing are omitted: what was“Honored Professor So-and-so” is now a simple “Hello”. Both students and also professors are reported to have a relaxed level of formality in email exchanges. This is usually seen as an influence of texting, where traditional messages of respect are omitted, but it can also be argued that the new brief communication style is a form of respecting the addressee’s time by writing efficiently.
Image Description | Photograph of a female texting; the shot does not show the person's face but emphasizes the phone.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), smartphone, text

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