WebSpeak - A Primer.

Posted by Rev. Mitcz

October 24, 2004

Tired of hearing people say things like “My internet is down”, “I got the internet”, “I was downloading the web the other night…” and a host of other phrases that, if they knew better, they’d never use - I have decided to write a little guide to what various internet terms mean, some webspeak, some 1337speak and a variety of other things to better inform those of you in need.

The most important thing to realize when talking about things online, is that “the internet”, “the web”, “the world wide web”, and “the net” are not necessarily the same thing. Furthermore, they’re an abstract. Abstract in the sense that none of them are actual things that you can own, download, or “get from a friend”. The biggest mistake I’ve found people making is confusing a browser (like Internet Explorer) with “the internet”. Your browser is not “the internet”. Sorry to burst your bubble.

With that in mind, let’s start with our first definition.

Internet (n.): An interconnected system of networks that connects computers around the world via the TCP/IP protocol.

Sounds confusing? It is. And, perhaps you’re also thinking “but Mitcz, that internet thing as defined by Dictionary.com sounds like a tangible, physical thing - not the abstract that you made it out to be.” Well, you’re partially right. There are physical computers and servers and routers and a number of other tangible items powering the collective “internet”, the overall internet that most people speak of when they reference “the internet” is an intangible, abstract idea. If this doesn’t make any sense to you, then ignore the official definition of what “the internet” actually is, and think to yourself “it’s an intangible system that runs throughout the world, connecting everyone, and no ONE person, ONE company, or ONE computer ‘owns’ it, nor have I ever, will I ever actually download the internet.”

This idea of the internet being an abstract also goes for “the web”, “the net” and “the world wide web”. Another definition:

World Wide Web (n. Abbr WWW): The complete set of documents residing on all Internet servers that use the HTTP protocol, accessible to users via a simple point-and-click system.

In layman’s terms, everything you’ve ever viewed in your browser was on the WWW. Hence the “http://www.somedomain.com” thing. HTTP, the first part of the url (which is rarely ever used by people typing in web addresses, because browsers are smarter now) stands for “HyperText Transport Protocol”. Before you think I’m just quoting Star Wars, allow me to explain.

What you’re reading right now has been coded specifically for delivery to a browser, represented as “styled text and images” in its most basic form. The way us web designers show you, the end user, this fancy looking shit instead of a boring, unstyled text document is through a programming language known as “HTML”. HTML stands for “HyperText Markup Language”. There’s that word again : hypertext. Don’t worry - it’s just a fancy word for “styled text that, in some cases, can be changed to - for instance - become a clickable link to another location, service, or function online”. See? It’s all very simple. Or perhaps I’m just confusing you. Hopefully you’re still with me. Let’s continue.

I know there’s a million geeks out there who would love to correct me on a great number of things I’ve said so far, and would love to extrapolate these definitions into a veritable history of all things technological - I’m not here to do that. The reason why so many people say ignorant things like “My internet is down” is because they don’t understand these basic principles. They don’t understand them because those in the know (nerds, usually) assume way too much about the knowledge of the person they’re talking to, and they end up confusing them. I’m here to help you, not confuse you.

Let’s play a little game of “correct my sentence” :

“The other night, I went to open AOL to check my e-mail, but my internet was down”

should be:

“The other night, when trying to check my e-mail through AOL, I couldn’t because my internet connection was on the fritz”

Or, as us people who fucking hate all things AOL (and I’ll explain why in a minute) would prefer you to say:

“The other night, my mom apparently sent me an e-mail from AOL, of all things. I wanted to actually download and read it, but my connection was all fucked”.

Notice some slang in there. “Internet connection” can just be called your “connection”. Just never “my internet”. It’s not your internet. It never was. It never will be. I use it too. So do over a billion other people.

Now, why all the hating on AOL?

Is it much like the hate for Macs? No. Some would confuse the arguments - as both are usually based, in part, on a disdain for anything “user-friendly”. Usually hardcore über-nerds will use that argument. Fuck them, they’re ignorant too.

The argument of why people hate AOL is less about it’s “user-friendly” ways. Hell, I’m a designer who strives for user-friendliness in everything I do. Hopefully you’ll find this site as easy to navigate, read and utilize to its full potential as CNN, MSN, and a host of others who’ve pumped millions of dollars into user-friendly interfaces. Granted, I don’t have the countless millions of dollars to figure out “just what do people want out of an angry blog site?” I also don’t give that much of a fuck, as I’ve never seen a dime from all the work I’ve done to this site. The day that changes, maybe I’ll spend even more time developing the ultimate AMF experience. Ahh… but I digress.

My point is that I’m not opposed to user-friendliness. I love it. I’m also a Mac user, so make your jokes now about user-friendly computing. All I know is that I’m 100% SpyWare free, and I’ve got many Windows-using friends who’ve spent a great deal of money so that they could say that about their computers - if only for a week. AOL, however, is not user-friendly. There. I said it. They’ve spent countless millions developing an interface that is user-centric and easy to use, but it’s not friendly. It’s not nice. It doesn’t teach you anything. AOL has spent so much time trying to “dumb down” the internet experience (notice I call it an “internet experience” - AOL is NOT THE FUCKING INTERNET) that they’ve locked their users into their interfaces for life. Almost anyone who’s made the jump from AOL to any other service, where your browsers and internet-enabled tools/games/etc are not limited to an AOL interface will find themselves immediately overwhelmed and confused. Why? Because AOL is so completely different from what the “regular” internet experience is like that they’ve locked their users into their system by dumbing everything down so much that anything deviating from that path is overwhelming. If that’s what you call “friendly”, then I’ve got a horrible president running for a second term you might want to vote for. Proof of this fact is in the proverbial “pudding”.

Ever tried to tell an AOL user “yeah, just attach the image to an e-mail and shoot it off to me”? Like predictable sheep, the response you’ll generally garner is “umm.. how do I do that?”. Those of us who haven’t used AOL in many many years (or ever, in some lucky cases) have only other popular e-mail client experiences to pull from, and we say something like “click the ‘attach’ button, navigate to the file, and hit ‘okay’. That should do it”. But, somehow we always end up with an e-mail that says “Here’s that picture!” and there’s no fucking picture to be found. Problem is, we have no idea how to help you there. Fucking AOL.

Enough about AOL - I’ve only scratched the surface of them anyway. Just know that if you’re on AOL, you should leave there immediately. They’re bad people. Real bad. Hit them with sticks.

Websites and Web Pages

I’m going to move on to “web pages” and “websites”. There is a difference, and it’s a difficult one to discern. The easiest thing I’ve come up with goes like this:

If there’s a “home”, “homepage”, or “news” button, you’re on a website.

Any page you navigate to (click your mouse on a link to) within that website is called a web page.

If there’s a name or logo at the top that says something about a “site” or “click for the front page”, etc. - you’re again on a website. It’s also good practice to assume any “.com”, “.net”, “.org”, etc. that you’re currently browsing is a website, and any documents you pull up on there are web pages.

Note that these websites can also just be called “sites” and web pages can be called “pages“.

Special note to make : there can also be sites within sites - as is the case with sites like GeoCities (though, these are generally still called “pages” but no one’s gonna shoot your head off if you call a GeoCities page a “website”).

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, I can move on to quickly define (not through the dictionary, but in layman’s terms) various other words/phrases you may have heard and been confused by.

More Terms

ISP(n.): An Internet Service Provider. This is the company that you’re paying to allow you to access services, sites, etc. on the internet. Much like your phone company gives you the ability to make a phone call - your ISP gives you the ability to “go online”.

Internet experience (n.): Not technically a term that one would use regularly, but this is what you’d call signing on to AOL. That’s not “your internet” that’s “your internet experience”. AOL provides a service where they not only act as an ISP, but they also provide you with a customized “internet experience”, where you’re using their browser, their tools/services, and their interface.

E-Mail client: What you use to check your e-mail. This could be something you pull up through a browser (like HotMail), which would be a web-based client, or it could be a standalone client like Outlook Express.

E-Mail

This brings us to E-mail speak. Thankfully, E-Mail hasn’t been confused too much over the years, and most people grasp the concept. However, again, AOL has fucked with people’s perception so much that there are a lot of misunderstandings about E-Mail and how E-Mail works. You see, if you’ve got a standalone E-Mail client, you can open that sucker up (irrespective of being online) and read your E-Mail. Granted, you’ll be reading e-mails that are “archived” (basically meaning “they’re old”) - but it’s still E-Mail all the same. When you’re online, your E-Mail client (whether it be web-based, standalone, or a combo of both like AOL) will generally download your E-Mail automatically at specified intervals, or manually when you tell it to. AOL fucks this up, because if you’re online reading your E-Mail, and you’re kicked offline - there goes your E-Mail. You’re immediately booted off and have to sign in again. In the real world (well, the real world online), you could continue to read your E-Mail, and only if you try to send or receive new E-Mail would you have a problem. The idea is, you shouldn’t have to be online to look at an old E-Mail. But both web-based clients and AOL alike force you to do this. I can’t teach you how to use a standalone E-Mail client, but it’s not as complex as one might think - so you should really look into it. Outlook Express, despite how much I can’t stand Microsoft, is easily the best of standalone e-mail clients for Windows (and OE for Mac OS 9 and Entourage for OS X, respectively, are their best Mac-based alternatives IMHO).

Chat Shorthand

Now, for some geeky IM-style webspeak. Most people know these terms by now, but for those of you who don’t - I’m going to run through some of the basics.

btw - By The Way.
LOL - Laughing Out Loud (or Lot Of Laughs, as some prefer). Personally, I just use “haha” for funny shit, and “heh” for mildly amusing shit.
brb - Be Right Back. The statute of limitations on this is about 5-10 mins.
bbiab - Be Back In A Bit. This is the “brb” for longer lengths of time - which is usable up to about an hour.
bbl - Be Back Later. If you’re planning to be gone for more than an hour, you should use this. It’s just good manners.
LMAO - Laughing My Ass Off. This is better than “LOL” in my opinion. Optionally, you could use “LMFAO” which is, of course, Laughing My Fucking Ass Off. Or get creative and make one up like “LMSFAOWTMI” being Laughing My Sick Fucking Ass Off While Touching Myself Inappropriately.
ROFL - Rolling On The Floor, Laughing. Can also be used in conjuction with LMAO as “ROFLMAO”.
IMO/IMHO - In My Opinion or In My Honest/Humble Opinion, respectively. You’ll note its usage in the above paragraph if you’ve been paying attention.
OMG/OMFG - Oh My God/Oh My Fucking God, respectively. If you’re shocked, you’d use this. Usually it’s just women who use it, but… who knows, you might feel differently.
*action* - Used for actions. I use it when I’m jokingly upset about something said, like *sigh*. You could also use it for affectionate purposes, like *hugs* *licks* *spanks* etc. Or in full sentences *whips out cock and smacks you with it*.

If you truly need more phrases, there are other sites that can help, so go check them out instead.

Now, what’s all this 1337 stuff?

1337 stands for “leet”. What’s “leet”? It’s the bastardization of “elite”, shortened. Back in the day, only elite hackers pretty much used and understood terms like “1337″. Now, it’s everywhere, as everyone thinks they’re 1337 and those who are 1337 would never use this over-used term. I’m sure they’re got a new term anyway, but I wouldn’t tell you if I knew it. 1 is I, 3 is E, 7 is T. Fuck it, I’ll have the Urban Dictionary explain it for you from here. They’ve got a pretty lengthy discussion on the subject, and it’ll all make sense.

Also, you’ll see things like “teh suck“, “ownz0red“, “pwned” and a host of other interesting words, terms, and phrases (often intentionally misspelled). Again, I advise you just type in your questionable word in the search field of the Urban Dictionary site and all questions (should) be answered.

If you ever wanna have fun w/people online - use “TEH”. It’s geekspeak for “the”. Like “this is teh suck!”. In live conversations, it’s also fun to use. And, btw, it’s prounounced “Tay-ah” with the “ah” sounding like the ass-end of Cartman (from South Park) saying “Respect Mah Authori-tah!”. Try it sometime, I think you’ll find it fun. The best instance I’ve ever seen “teh” used in was a small .gif image that my friend Mikey had once as his desktop picture (being blown up to desktop size so it was horribly pixelated only added to the effect) that had a picture of a cartoon-ish contstruction guy with a note in his hand, pointing up at a 45 degree angle and it just said “You suck at TEH INTERNET”. Man, that’s good stuff.

Putting It All Together

I know I’ve barely scratched the surface on web speak, internet terminology and 1337speak. I know there’s a great many pages that can and have been written on these subjects. But, as I said, this is a primer. A place to get you started. In conclusion, I’m going to correct some commonly misused sentences, and leave you to sound a little smarter today than you did yesterday.

WRONG :