Nigerians' spelling and writing skill and articulation have become worrisome since the use of GSM in the country. No thanks to the use of short codes in writing text messages. They are so ignorant of their poor spelling and writing skill that they even forget the existence of Dictionary. A West African Examination Council Officer (WAEC) also relates how some candidates used the text messages short code in answering Waec questions in recent times.That is how bad the habit is among the youths. A friend of mine who I shared this issue with recently also confessed how she was almost issued query for 'mistakenly' used the text message short codes in an official letter in her Office. What a menace. Hmmm, Nigeria - always one step forward, two steps backward.


The solution is just self-moderation; We should know when and when not to use these short codes.

Comment please.

I agree 100%

Yeah, sad. The funny thing is that we learnt it from the Western world, but now it's no longer as popular over there as it is over here.

I agree 200% From now onwards I shall not use short codes anymore even on this site

Abbreviations are okay as long as you know when to use them in either a formal or informal conversation.Sadly,it has eaten deep into the mindset of most people and they cannot recognise the divide anymore.As for me,i rarely send text messages and when i do,all words are spelt as seen in a dictionary.

mannygee:

Nigerians' spelling and writing skill and articulation have become worrisome since the use of GSM in the country. No thanks to the use of short codes in writing text messages. They are so ignorant of their poor spelling and writing skill that they even forget the existence of Dictionary. A West African Examination Council Officer (WAEC) also relates how some candidates used the text messages short code in answering Waec questions in recent times.That is how bad the habit is among the youths. A friend of mine who I shared this issue with recently also confessed how she was almost issued query for 'mistakenly' used the text message short codes in an official letter in her Office. What a menace. Hmmm, Nigeria - always one step forward, two steps backward.


The solution is just self-moderation; We should know when and when not to use these short codes.

Comment please.

Very true and it's common on Nairaland too. Text posting pisses me off so much. . .I've even had cause in the past to ask one or two people why they like text-posting.

Na GSM cause am. . .you know, the need to squeeze as many words into a single text message since the limit is 160 words (including spaces & punctuations) to save cost

Like you said, self-moderation is the key and one should know when to text-post or not. I send text messages quite often and whether I text-post or not depends on the person I'm sending the SMS.

When I abbreviate for sms, I will thoroughly read it again,to be sure maybe an average nigerian who do not abbreviate could understand my message;still in doubt,I will rather use 2 pages!
I have never used it formally (in school) before- aside; dont,did'nt,could'nt etc

Hmmmm. Self-acknowledgement is the beginning of self-correction. Maybe we (Nigerians) should start re-branding ourselves with this issues. lol