Wut u doing l8r

Wut u doing l8r. Can't wait to tell u bout JW. ROTFLMAO. Cya

What on earth is happing to our language? It started off with text (SMS) and then instant messaging. But now this shorthand is beginning to appear everywhere. It's not that I hate the lack of grammar and the spelling nightmare – who am I kidding, yes I do – but this need to abbreviate everything is destroying the richness of English.

Long considered the most diverse and expressive language in the world, English is being abused and corrupted in our haste to express ourselves faster. (I argue though the amount of time it takes to translate ROTFLMAO when you read is actually slower than reading the actual words).

My youngest brother grew up in the IM era (I did not) and has no trouble at all sending me long and complicated digital messages in shorthand. I struggle through them and get the idea, but I miss the emotion and connection I get when reading something in "proper" English.

I'm not suggesting a return to Shakespearean prose, after all Claudio's cry "Done to death by slanderous tongue, was the hero that here lies" is not that easy to understand at first glance either. I fear however, that our eagerness to embrace this abbreviated communication style is eliminating words that by their very nature can not easily be bastardised. How can you possibly turn magnificence, glittering, torture or translucent into four-letter contractions? How do you express the real joy of watching your child take his first steps with "OMG was gr8." And how does "143" really tell someone the depth of your feelings?
wot d hell

Michelle Walkden

Communications consultant

So, who’s JG Communication? We’re Sweden’s largest and, we think, ‘leading’ communications agency in Sweden. We help our clients have conversations with the people that matter most to them using the tools that matter most to us, words, sound and vision.

Andra bloggar om: kommunikation, företagskommunikation

Poor spelling = poor credibility

As an editor, I am known to whine openly and loudly about poor grammar, misspellings and the general lack of commitment to "proper English," and then just as quickly to excuse myself by saying: "I'm probably one of the 10 people on the whole planet who care."

Well, it seems I am wrong. According to a study discussed at the User Experience seminar in Amsterdam, such mistakes are among the top reasons readers give for not trusting a website.

Admittedly, the study, by B.J. Fogg, found that sites that are rarely updated, do not include a real-world company address and have a mass of annoying pop-up ads have even less credibility.

Interestingly for me, a self-proclaimed cynic, including the credentials of the author of an article or piece of content, and testimonials that can be clearly traced to real people, has been found to boost a site's credibility.

And tying neatly back to my earlier posting, objective writing – rather than "marketese" or "spin" – that is backed up by supporting evidence is essential for earning readers’ trust.

/Michelle Walkden

Other blogs on: editorial, language, reading, writing, writing for the web, kommunikation, företagskommunikation, communications, corporate communications

Don’t be lazy! Make content easy to read

Web readers are impatient, skeptical and lazy: or so we as communicators are always told. But after this morning's Content Usability session at the User Experience seminar in Amsterdam I am beginning to think it is web producers, not readers, who are lazy.

Lecturer John Morkes walked participants through a study he and web usability guru Jakob Nielsen conducted in the States some years ago. Essentially they produced four versions of a website. In addition to the original highly promotional approach, one was was optimized to be easily scanned, the second was brutally concise (less than 50 percent of the original), the third was very objective (no opinion whatsoever) and the last was a mix of the three.

It turned out that using any of the three new versions (easily scanned, concise and objective) improved usability and overall reader satisfaction - cutting the word length alone boosted satisfaction by 58 percent - but it was the combination of the three that was staggering. Morkes and Nielsen reported a 124 percent improvement in usability through relatively simple changes to the way content was written.

The explanation: web reading is hard, 10 percent harder at least than printed material, and requires more thinking, known as cognitive load. Making it easier for people to process information is therefore key. Concise content means less to process. Scannable content helps people find the text they should focus on. And objective texts eliminate all the subjective questions and arguments that distract readers from what you want them to know.

So when you develop content, think short, accurate and to the point.

/Michelle



Read more blogs on: writing, writing for the web, language, editorial, communications, reading

Orden versus kroppsspråket

För snart tio år sedan såg jag Teaterstudio Ledermans föreställning Mozart versus Salieri. Föreställningen utgick ifrån den text Aleksander Pusjkin skrev när ryktet nådde honom om Mozarts dramatiska död.

I manuset hade Pusjkin inte skrivit några instruktioner om hur texten skulle framföras, och teaterstudio Lederman framförde texten på olika sätt i samma föreställning. Det var fascinerande att se vilken innebörd orden fick när Mozart gestaltades som naivt oskyldig i sin relation till Salieri, eller när de spelade upp samma scen men med en mer desillusionerad Mozart.

Ett budskap består såväl av vad som sägs, orden, som hur det sägs, presentationen. En del säger att så lite som tio procent av det vi uppfattar i en presentation är själva orden. Resten är visuella och känslomässiga intryck.
- Kroppsspråket säger mycket, men vi är inte vana att tolka det, inser Ruter Dams VD Gunilla Arhén efter att ha gått en ledarskapsutbildning i Jurij Ledermans regi.

Jag visste inte ens att Lederman hade kurser i ledarskap. Det fick jag veta när jag läste artikeln I mörkret hos Lederman släpper ledarnas scenskräck, där han säger att en bra början är att bli medveten om egna och andras beteenden. En så ’enkel’ sak som att sätta sig på en stol handlar om makt, att ta rummet i besittning.

Min kollega och vän Elizabeth håller kurser i presentationsteknik och seminarier i hur man skapar sitt eget varumärke för att få ut sina budskap. Hon vet att det är avgörande hur man förmedlar det man vill ha sagt:
- Ingen är född till talare. Alla, även slipade politiker, måste träna för att få fram sitt budskap.

Om vi inte kan presentera vårt budskap på ett övertygande sätt spelar det ingen roll om vi har massor av kunskap och erfarenhet.

Precis som en skådespelare övar inför en föreställning eller idrottsmannen tränar inför en tävling måste den som vill förmedla något öva - både på vad som ska sägas och hur det ska framföras. Det är så vi kan bli bättre på att övertyga, sälja in våra budskap eller få med andra på en ny idé.


/Helle

Battling your language demons

I recently read the following headline in the real estate section of a Stockholm-area newspaper: Nyrenoverad 2:a i "Down town" (Translation: Newly renovated 1 bedroom apt).
This bothered me - and not just because I come from New Jersey (New Jersey people are always miffed at something).

Everything is wrong with the phrase “Down town” in this context. For starters you would normally spell it as one word and I have absolutely no idea what the quotes are being used for. And why English? The apartment is in Stockholm, Sweden - where they speak and negotiate for real estate in Swedish.

When the citizens of Babel began to speak in tongues, they did a pretty good job developing their own forms of communication to very accurately get across what they wanted to say. So, why inject your writing with foreign words that only confuse (or anger) your reader?

I realize every language incorporates foreign words into their vocabulary but personally I think writers should remain consistent with the original meaning (and spelling) of the word, otherwise things could get a little verückt.



/David Francisco

Svenska eller engelska

Igår hade vi ytterligare en diskussion om våra språk och hur vi tror läsarna kommer att uppfatta det när vissa texter är på svenska och andra på engelska. Det viktiga tycker jag är att vi som deltar i detta tycker att det är kul att skriva, och det är oftast roligast att skriva på sitt eget språk. Tre av skribenterna kommer skriva på engelska och tre på svenska.

Det speglar hur vi har det på jobbet, där de engelskspråkiga kämpar med att lära sig svenska, och de svenskspråkiga ofta måste arbeta och uttrycka sig på engelska. Här i bloggen får vi skriva fritt och det är åtminstone jag glad för.

/Eva