Tech Speak

The free flow of language means that expressions flow back and forth between written language and spoken language. This is especially true with phrases that have a technical meaning, and yet people have started saying them. For example, I have heard several people say that they want to double click into something, meaning that they want to dig into it a little deeper. This action is familiar to anyone who has used a computer mouse to double click a link to open a page with more information.

Another recent example is TL;DR. This has become internet speak for a summary of what’s below. It stands for too long; didn’t read and it was a common response to a shared article or email that the recipient didn’t read. Maybe it was long. Maybe it wasn’t. I recently heard someone use this in conversation to just mean here’s a summary.