12 réponses à ce sujet

[david46]

Since I am 63 and don't have many occasions to learn the evolving internet lingo I am having some trouble understanding some posts. Some posts I come across have had blocks of asterisks in them. I wonder just what these blocks mean as they don't make any sense in the post. Is this some kind of secret code between friends? Does the number of asrerisks have any significance? Should this be reported to Homeland Security?

I asked my daughter but she won 't tell me what is going on. Said something about not wanting to dispel her Dad's illusions. I hate it when she plays as a mage and becomes cryptic and mysterious. She once made me a list of codewords that people use like ROTFL and such but no asterisks.

It would really help out the older generation of players if you could refrain from using codes and such in posts.

[Cuuniyevo]

Wrong forum, but okay… They're usually used to mean the same thing as a _ would in the game Hangman. Each one represents a letter and you have to guess what they are. However, if you see one that is only four asterisks long, it doesn't necessarily represent a four-letter word, it might be anything, just rounded down by the language filter on the forum.

Alternatively, they don't mean any kind of cursing at all, they're just strategically placed to obscure spoilers in a non-spoiler section. So in that case, yes, they're a secret code meant to confound the uninitiated.

[stribies]

Tell your daughter that your illusions are a huge threat to her mana pool and she needs to help you annihilate them.

[daddytat]

One time I said the word "****" and it replaced it with ****

As I am sure it will do it again I will just define the word.

"a pejorative term meaning an individual who is sexually promiscuous"

Perhaps it is a vernacular term or politically uncorrect but certainly colorfull ;-)

Modifié par daddytat, 14 janvier 2010 - 07:57 .

[Chained_Creator]

david46 wrote...
 Should this be reported to Homeland Security?

Yes, yes it should. It's part of the underappreciated youth- (Commies, man, the commies are co-) Shush, you! It's part of the underappreciated youth's plan to take over the world starting with the most powerful single-nation economy on the planet and from there conquering all other countries through hostile economic takeover and, if necessary, military force!

(Save yourself! Report it while you ca-!)

[elys]

david46 wrote...

Since I am 63 and don't have many occasions to learn the evolving internet lingo I am having some trouble understanding some posts. ...

**** is mostly a way to "redact" words on a message, the same way you would do it with a black marker on paper.
So in this forum case, it's mostly either to hide some swearing words, or to avoid spoiling informations.

[Greenphrog]

I have had the same issues. I played a lot of MMO with my son. Im usally the mage, so I have it a little better. He wants that haste bufff righhhhht?



It would not have helped much in this issue, and it is in any case well explained above. If you do a search on a term you are onfamilier with (Google it!), you can usally come up with a meaning. There are also seavral internet dictionary's around.

[mousestalker]

You kids get off my lawn!

[david46]

elys wrote...

**** is mostly a way to "redact" words on a message, the same way you would do it with a black marker on paper.
So in this forum case, it's mostly either to hide some swearing words, or to avoid spoiling informations.

Ah, so in a forum that allows spoilers then the poster is circumventing the owner's desire to "keep it clean " and inject what some call cursing into the forum. Strange that people agree to the terms of use and then devise ways to circumvent them. I guess it is a limited vocabulary and lack of creative thinking that causes this. Having read Batman comics as a kid am fond of the creative and funny ways Robin used in place of the same old words used over and over again. Maybe that is why the Monty Python line in a heated discussion,"Intercourse the penguin" is funny rather than the mundane alternative.

[elys]

There is also the matter than many users, such as myself, are not english native speakers, and so have limited grammatical, orthographical and vocabulary levels in the Shakespeare's tongue.

So the difficulty of writing simple ideas is already enough without trying to be creative

Another factor with modern communication devices is that people now write directly the same way they talk (SMS, MSN, IRC generations).

So that what happens on forums as well. But at least this board so far have been spared from all the SMS-writing style.

[david46]

It has been my experience that most Europeans with English as a second language have better vocabularies and grammar than those educated in the modern American schools. The newer is better mentality of "modern" educators is a disaster. Communicating with the kids down the street is sometimes more difficult than with my daughter's Belgian boyfriend. I guess since I have never had a cell phone or used internet messaging I am ill equipped for the modern age.

[Cybercat999]

david46 wrote...

It has been my experience that most Europeans with English as a second language have better vocabularies and grammar than those educated in the modern American schools. The newer is better mentality of "modern" educators is a disaster. Communicating with the kids down the street is sometimes more difficult than with my daughter's Belgian boyfriend. I guess since I have never had a cell phone or used internet messaging I am ill equipped for the modern age.

Now isnt that a truth. But dont worry, you can still catch up. I taught my 72 yo Mother to use text messaging in no time (I did get her one of those old Nokias with huge screen tho).

[Tim15856]

I'm glad to see I'm not the only old fart in the forum.