If you've been joining in chat room conversations, or trading e-mail with Web pals, you have bee one of the millions who write in a peculiarly short form of English.
And you've got a sense of humor about short forms like SOHF(=sense of humor failure) to describe Internet newers who don't understand you.
Across the globe, every night teenagers and their elders are “talking” online—many of them are talking at the same time.
It's fast: try talking to six people at once. It's brief: three or four words per exchange. It takes wit, concentration, and quick fingers.
And it requires tremendous linguistic economy. There's neither time nor space for explanations. Why consume precious key-strokes telling six friends you have to leave for a moment to take care of your little brother when BRB(=be right back) will do? Want to enter a conversation? Just type PMFJI(=pardon me for jumping in). Interested in whom you're talking to? Type A/S/L, the nearly universal request to know your pal's age, sex and location. You may get 15/M/NY as a response from your pal.
If something makes you laugh, say you're OTF(=on the floor),or LOL(=laughing out loud),or bine the two into ROTFL(=rolling on the floor laughing).
And when it's time to get back to work or go to bed, you type GTG(=got to go) or TTYL(talk to you later).
People want to write as fast as possible, and they want to get their ideas across as quickly as they can. Capital letters are left in the dust, except when expressing emotion, as it takes more time to hold down the “shift” key and capitals. Punctuation is going, too.
【小题1】In order to talk to several people at the same time on the Internet .A．you have to speak fast and fluentlyB．you have to express your ideas in a brief wayC．you should speak with wit and humorD．one should pay much attention to the accuracy of the words【小题2】If you get 17/F/NY as an answer to your A/S/L, it means .A．the person on the other end is 17 from New York and he is fineB．you are talking to a girl who is 17 and lives in New YorkC．you are talking to 17 girls who are from New YorkD．the person who are talking to you is a 1.7-foot tall New York girl【小题3】To save time on the Internet .A．some people leave their letters in the dustbinB．some people never use “shift” in their writingC．many people leave the capital and punctuationD．people seldom use capital letters or punctuationB
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(答案→)B
解析：文章介绍了在网上聊天的时候，同时和很多人聊天，需要简单的表达方式，作者举了很多例子说明如何运用缩写的方式表达一定的含义。
【小题1】细节题，从第一段you have bee one of the millions who write in a peculiarly short form of English.可知要想同时和几个人交谈，需要用简单的方式表达。可知选B。
【小题2】细节题：从本句“Type A/S/L, the nearly universal request to know you pal’s age, sex and location.” 可知“A/S/L”是“age, sex and location”的缩写。可知这是住在纽约的一个17岁的女孩。选B。
【小题1】细节题：最后一段“…left in the dust”意思是“丢在脑后” 。按下“Shift”键键入大写字母太费 时间，因此聊友常常不使用大写字母，标点符号也省掉了。选D。