Welcome to Part II of this First We Dream “Dream 10″ Guide on how to elegantly fit what you’re trying to say into those scant few 140 characters in Twitter!  If you skipped Part I, it’s vital you start there, so you understand the first five tips before proceeding.

Otherwise, let’s move on to tip 6, next page!

If you’re a member of the A.D.D. generations- or a President of the “Death to the English Language” club, and are a regular on the best social media site out there- Twitter- you probably don’t care how unreadable your Tweet is when you jam your commentary into 140 characters.  You’re making up words, abbreviating everything into forms that word has never been abbreviated into in the history of mankind, replacing every you and two with “U and 2″ (it’s only cool when Prince does it!). You’re struggling to jam what you want to say into a limited space- and in the process you’re often losing your point while simultaenously confusing anyone reading your Tweets into a heaping pile of “what the hell did that mean?”

Fear not: I present the First We Dream “Dream 10″ Guide of ways to help you fit your Tweets into 140 characters, be able to speak in proper English (with some obviously necessary exceptions), and make sense at the same time (well, depending on content- that remains up to you.)

Important Note:

Keep in mind one important Tweet-size rule though:  You can jam a Tweet in at exactly 140 characters, but MOST Tweets (unless you only stick to your few followers) will need one to four hashtag (#) channel labels that count towards the 140 characters.  You have to learn to write clean, but short so you have room for those hashtags, and for other people to RT (re-Tweet) your witty statement with your Twittertag included in that 140 limit.

Tip one, next page!

“You teach a child to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test.”

~ President George W. Bush, Feb. 21, 2001

I’m afraid I have bad news to pass on. One of our most beloved cultural traditions has passed away. For many of us, it allowed us to talk to other members of our nation and some in the international world. With this tragic death, our ability to communicate in a clear and concise manner is now in dire jeopardy.

English Language
R.I.P.
5th Century – 21st Century

Yes, I’m being facetious here, but my point is valid. There is a conscious mindset in the (American) English speaking world, predominately by the younger generations, that being able to spell or speak the language properly is not important, especially once you begin discussing the use of language online. With this apathetic mindset, the death of the language begins.

While online in games or on forums, you can’t throw a letter “Y” without seeing countless atrocious errors in spelling and grammar. No one is perfect when it comes to spelling, and when you’re talking about the online experience, typos are to be expected. The only danger in always ignoring your errors is when you do need to be perfect, either in school or more importantly the professional environment, you will find yourself falling into the same habitual errors you are used to shrugging off. You will not simply cease all of your bad grammar habits magically.  And I hate to break it to you- spelling and grammar checkers don’t catch many issues. You’re on your own.

Don’t believe me? Turn on cable news and watch the ticker for half an hour. I know one day I counted approximately 24 errors in spelling, grammar and omitted words. 24 errors in 30 minutes? On a major news source? No boss in any environment should (or will) find that acceptable. Nor should you. There are examples of this kind everywhere you look- schools, billboards, TV shows… listen to the speeches our last President gave- bless the dictionary, he made words up and horrendously butchered simple grammatical phrases (see the quote at top)! Fair or not, people do judge other people’s writing and speaking as a large indicator of their level of intelligence.

You don’t agree that your IQ is judged by your online linguistics? Tell me, which of the following people would you assume is more intelligent, if you’d never met them and just read the following conversation online:

Person A.) “u no I can spell grate when I want too- its not like i do this in at werk.”

Person B.) “I’m afraid that’s untrue. If you’re used to making those types of errors, you’ll make them in other areas of your life, costing time- which is money.”

Obviously, not only is person “B” far more clear in your ability to understand, you absolutely will believe that person is more intelligent. It’s not to say they are, but the judgment will occur. And who wants to present themselves to others as (possibly) stupid? This is all something easy to overcome! With the spell checking tools available online, many of these simple spelling errors can be eliminated just by right clicking on the word with your mouse! Often you don’t even have to retype a word- just click and select the correct spelling! And if you’re online, please tell me- if you don’t know how to spell a word- why is it so hard to go to dictionary.com and look it up? You don’t even need to go to the site- just type how you think the word is spelled in your browser address bar and Google will magically take you to a dictionary site – or provide the correct spelling for you to copy and paste!  Dirt simple! The point is- you should want to correct your spelling errors.

What of grammar, though? Spell checkers do not catch the majority of grammar errors. This is shown all too often in those who rely on them to solve all of their writing woes. We’re not speaking of perfection in grammar. Active/passive tense, phrasing of sentences… some aspects of grammar cause professional writers to balk every day. Instead we’re talking basic grammar that everyone should know. One quick solution for improvement is making sure you understand homonyms and possessives.

Let’s start with homonyms. Homonyms are words that sounds alike but mean different things. For instance, “steak” and “stake”. I don’t know about you, but I certainly wouldn’t wish to try eating a stake. Even with ketchup. There are many homonyms in English, but you can vastly improve your language skills simply by understanding the top five most used ones.

At the top of that list? Words such as there / their / they’re. If you’re going to travel to another destination, you’re going to go there. If someone has or owns something, it is their item. And if your friends went to the bar an hour ahead of you, they’re likely already drunk. Sound insulting and basic to you? Look around online- you’ll be surprised how common these words are incorrectly substituted for each other.

Possessives are constantly being misused. One of my biggest pet peeves is the lack of knowledge surrounding “your” and “you’re”. It’s extremely easy to master this, and makes you instantly look 100 times more intelligent! “You’re“ is a contraction. It stands for “you are”. Always. In every case. (I had someone argue this point with me once, to their great embarrassment when 50 people corrected them.)

Tell me- when you consider “you’re” stands for “you are”, does it make any sense at all to see the sentence, “Your stupid!” Absolutely not! When I see someone say something of the sort, my first response is “I don’t own a stupid!” or “My stupid did what?” Not so coincidentally, the original speaker never quite understands my response. Get in the habit of reading contractions out in your head- when you see “you’re”, your mind should be auto-translating to “you are”. Once you begin doing this, you’ll rarely make mistakes of this sort again.

“One of the most frightening things about your true nerd, for many people, is not that he’s socially inept- because everybody’s been there- but rather his complete lack of embarrassment about it.”
~Neal Stephenson

Labels are a sign of a mentally weak mind, but as a society, we’re simply brainwashed into thinking it’s an acceptable process. While I’d like to present something here that would help to make people think twice about using labels upon others, I realize the futility of such an act. Instead, I’m going to address a pet peeve of mine- the constant incorrect use of three particular labels, often interchangeably- a crime of the language!

What we’re going to tackle are the three often-used labels known as Nerd, Geek and Dork.

Everyone’s certainly called someone or been called these terms (shame on you and I) but there’s now a new trend in today’s world to claim one of these titles for yourself- an attempt to counter the negative associations and make the labels “cool”. Let’s find out more about what the proper non-dictionary use of each one is, so you know what to call yourself-  if you wish to self-claim one of these roles, or to correct anyone calling you the wrong thing.

A nerd is a book-smart, socially inept type of person. Nerds are not capable of understanding or caring how to properly fit into society in a societally manner. This is most apparent in their inability to dress in even the most rudimentary of acceptable fashions.  You’ve certainly seen the stereotype picture of the nerd- dark, broken glasses held together by tape, pocket protector in shirt and so-on, so forth. This is, of course, an extreme stereotype. In actuality you’re simply talking about someone who fails to realize (or care) that they are wearing mismatched colors, clothing items or committing other basic fashion faux pas.

Beyond fashion, the nerd is highly introverted and only comfortable around others with extremely similar interests.  A majority of nerds do have a tendency to flock to interests that those within society who consider themselves “macho” or “cool” deliberately choose to avoid in order to prevent being labeled a nerd, such as affection of Science Fiction or Fantasy, computer games, or what strike these people as “juvenile”.  Nerds are also considered to be anti-sport and entirely uninterested in any form of sports participation or viewing. (All of this is an incorrect assessment, but rather the prevalent stereotype.)

Ultimately to be a nerd there must be some level of social ineptitude- a disconnect with how the majority of us act within society. However, at some level within us all, we have a trace of nerd- so don’t get too high and mighty in picking on nerds… you are one yourself, in some way or another.

A geek is anyone who is passionate about a particular topic (or topics). You can be a computer geek (like me), a Lost TV show geek (like me), a Prince geek (like me)… if it exists, and you are beyond passionate about it to the point your knowledge puts you into expert territory, you’re a geek of that topic.  Unlike nerds, though, geeks do not have an element of social ineptitude. The most stylish dresser or suave conversationalist amongst us may in fact be a geek concerning something they hold interest in- you won’t identify a geek by looks, but rather by passionate discussion, actions or their tendency to own collections to geek over.  Some people do have a belief that “geek” only applies to technologically obsessed types, but again, the subject of geekdom can be anything.

Many people confuse nerd and geek quite readily, and these two are the most interchangeably used.  However, there is a negative association with the term “nerd”, whereas “geek” is now an acceptable title to proclaim being.  I cringe when I hear people trying to interchange “nerd” for “geek” and professing themselves to be a nerd, or the cute T-shirts that some women wear that say “I love nerds”- while that’s great if true, in most cases what they’re thinking of, is in fact, a geek.

Last, we have the label of dork. This is commonly misused as another term for nerd or geek, but that is entirely incorrect.

A dork is simply a more modern version of a clown- “clown” is too dated a term to use as a label, and too specific an image (of a traditional circus clown) is conjured up in one’s mind.  Therefore, one who is being extremely silly or goofy, whether intentionally or by accident, is called a “dork”.

However, there’s a rule to “dork” that is broken constantly- anyone, at any time, can be a dork- but only for a limited time. You cannot be a dork permanently- it is a temporary state. One does or says something dorky, then reverts back to their normal state of being. Therefore, it’s incorrect to say “he’s such a dork”- it’s only correct to say “he’s being such a dork”.  After all, the most recurring of all dorks will at some point do something that is neither goofy nor silly, and at that point is no longer a dork, whereas a nerd never ceases being a nerd, nor a geek being a geek.

Now you have a better idea of how these labels are properly applied- not by their definition within the dictionary (for the meaning of labels changes so much faster than dictionaries are released), so if you wish to use them you’ll have a correct approach to the matter. Again, I’ll take the high road and remind you if you wish to be a wise and enlightened person, you’ll learn that people always tend to break out of predefined labels- often in ways that will surprise you- so you’ll try to learn to break your societal brainwashing and not use such terms. But, since that’s as likely as pigs flying, at least properly use these terms- and if you’re so inclined, you now understand better which one to choose one for yourself- or from which to defend your honor.

I only bring this up because my inner nerd demanded it.  You see, I’m an English language geek, so I really had to get this off my chest.  I guess in the end I’m just being a dork for bringing this up!