Grokking Txter Code

One of the strengths of the English language is its malleability. Spoken around the world, the language twists and turns, morphs and absorbs, in a constant state of evolution.

The advent of cell-phones created a whole new language branch. Mapping the letters of the alphabet onto a 10-key pad has created all sorts of amusingly garbled messages. Far from being put off by this, instant messengers have embraced it. A whole generation has come to be that has mastered the limitations of the technology. Motivated, I’m sure, by the ability to hide their messages in plain sight, invisible to by anyone over 30.

Along with the obligatory picture of a cat, comes the site "I has 1337 Code. LOL!!1" At first glance as impenetrable as Mandarin Chinese, it’s a gas once you figure it out. Try this one on for size:

COUNT!!1:

HAI
CAN HAS STDIO?
I HAS A VAR
     IM IN YR LOOP
     UP VAR!!1
     VISIBLE VAR
     IZ VAR BIGGER THAN 10? KTHXBYE
IM OUTTA YR LOOP
KTHXBYE

Back in the day we just dropped vowels... these kids are way more creative. Enjoy some more at lolcode.com

About the Author

Personal Information

Biography

Prior to joining RAD, Max was Senior Vice President of Maptuit Corporation, a provider of location-based web services. Before co-founding Maptuit, Max was a management consultant and launched, amongst others, Canada’s largest online retailer, Indigo Books & Music.

Earlier in his career, Max led a number of successful engineering teams. As a principal of dotSoftware, his team aided in the creation of 724 Solutions’ wireless banking services. As Vice President of Product Development for Visible Decisions, he led the creation of three generations of visualization systems and worked on many financial services and national defense projects.

Max began his career in the Strategic Research group of Alias Research. Max has a MSc in Computer Science from the University of Guelph.

Max enjoys being outdoors as often as possible and counts diving, trekking, kayaking, and motorcycling amongst his favored ways of exploring the planet.

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