Acronyms on the Social Internet
TIL: This thing is very useful IMHO
… what ???
Table of Contents
Acronyms
- ALT (Text)
- Alternative Text
- ALT-Text is a kind of image description that describes the meaning of or the intention behind an image (but not necessarily every visual detail) so it helps people who can't see (slow connection, broken link, blind, …) or understand image for some reason.
- It can also be used as an art-form where the ALT-Text serves its original function and is itself worth reading because it is written in a creative way.
- alt (Account)
- Alternative/Secondary Account
- Some people have multiple Accounts they publish on or openly keep as backups, these may be referred to as alt accounts or
alts
. - CW
- Content Warning
- DM
- Direct Message
- Message sent with restricted visibility to only a few intended recipients.
- IMO
- In My Opinion
- IMHO
- In My Honest Opinion
- OH
- Over Heard
- Usually used as a prefix for posts quoting something funny someone overheard.
- The variation
Self OH
means someone is quoting themselves. - RFC
- Request For Comments
- Either refers to the IETF/IRTF/IAB RFC specifications, a project specific RFC system or a standalone document someone wants feedback on.
- TIL
- Today I Learned
- Used as a prefix for posts where someone who just learned about something is sharing that information. Usually because that information is considered useful.
This list isn't complete, it'll be expanded as people ask me or I learn about things myself.
Also see the list of Acronyms for content warnings below.
Tone Indicators
Tone indicators like /s are sometimes appended to the end of a message to signal the intention behind a message (i.e. sarcasm), because on the internet things aren't always obvious (evidence: you are reading this article). They always start with a forward slash /.
The most important/common ones are:
/s- sarcasm
/j- joking
/hj- half joking
Acronyms for Content Warnings
Content warnings are an important mechanism to let people opt out of content they might find uncomfortable to very stressing. To keep the needed effort low a bunch of acronyms to tag common
+- Positive Content
- Used as a suffix the poster thinks the content behind the warning is on the more positive side of things.
-- Negative Content
- Used as a suffix the poster thinks the content behind the warning is on the more negative side of things.
- ph
- Physical Health
- Usually content mentioning injuries or other physical health issues
- mh
- Mental Health
- Content mentioning mental health issues
- pol, depol, uspol, …
- Politics
- Usually used as part of Content Warning messages to flag messages mentioning politics, it can be prefixed by a two or three letter country reference to quickly communicate which country is talked about.