Totally Book
Apparently kids have started saying to one another things like, "Wow, that's so book!"
The last time I managed to exit my bubble long enough to become aware of yoof culture, they were using "bum" in an equivalent sense.
Not sure which I like better, actually. Bum, book. Book, bum. Both good words.
Anyway, why book? I hear you ask. Unless, of course, every blogger and her girlfriend has already noted the phenomenon. In which case, well, sorry. But that's what you get for living in a bubble. And I'm damned if I'm stepping out of it just to give you the comfort of not having to read the same story twice. Anyway, why book?
It's a predictive text thing. Type 'book' into your phone and then cycle through the options. If you don't have predictive text and/or have no idea what I'm talking about, I'll explain in the comments box.
The last time I managed to exit my bubble long enough to become aware of yoof culture, they were using "bum" in an equivalent sense.
Not sure which I like better, actually. Bum, book. Book, bum. Both good words.
Anyway, why book? I hear you ask. Unless, of course, every blogger and her girlfriend has already noted the phenomenon. In which case, well, sorry. But that's what you get for living in a bubble. And I'm damned if I'm stepping out of it just to give you the comfort of not having to read the same story twice. Anyway, why book?
It's a predictive text thing. Type 'book' into your phone and then cycle through the options. If you don't have predictive text and/or have no idea what I'm talking about, I'll explain in the comments box.
3 Comments:
And, yes, it's likely that nobody else lives in a bubble like mine, where I only discovered predictive text six months ago. But just in case there are any fellow bubble-dwellers out there...
Predictive text is something mobile phone users take advantage of when they text people. It relies on the fact that each key on a telephone key pad represents three letters or more.
In non-predictive-text mode, you have to cycle through all the letters on each key to print the one you want. But predictive text looks at the keys you are pressing, and then guesses the most likely word based on the combination of keys.
For instance, the '2' key also represents A, B and C. The '6' key is M, N and O. And the '5' key is J, K and L.
So if someone keys 2665, there are a range of possible four-letter words:
(a,B,c) (m,n,O) (m,n,O) (j,K,l)
or
(a,b,C) (m,n,O) (m,n,O) (j,k,L)
Predictive text assumes you mean the most commonly-used word out of the available options. If you mean a different word, you have to manually select it. It's easy to forget to do this, because (amazingly) in the majority of cases, predictive text guesses exactly what you mean.
If you type the above combination of letters, predictive text will assume you mean BOOK.
Rather than COOL.
Of course, I bet everyone opening this comments box already knows exactly what predictive text is. And anyone who doesn't is still scratching their head and wondering what the hell I'm on about.
Oh well.
I think I came across this a few weeks ago (but can't recall where). I'm afraid I'm something of a 60s throwback, still using "fab" I'm afraid!
The Bum thing (I know you commented about this but can't find it) was just an example of a bizarre word being used by yoof to mean "great". It's not text-related...
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