I am willing to bet that those of you who are say under 30 will immediately understand that ROTFL means in text speak “Roll on the Floor Laughing”. It’s like LOL “Laugh out Loud”. Others like me perhaps a bit less familiar with the use of these terms may struggle to understand straight away.
"Texting language" means the abbreviations and slang commonly used with mobile phone text messaging, or other Internet-based communication such as email. Here is a site with a comprehensive list of these acronyms for those less familiar with them.
In texting as in anything else misunderstandings can be unfortunate and illustrate the importance of exact understanding. If a friend texts asking for support in a time of personal crisis and you text back LOL thinking it means Lots of Love, you will not be popular.
The same is equally true but more so in contracts. TLA’s (that’s Three Letter Acronym’s) are often used with abandon in many IT agreements and in their negotiation. Discussing the technical schedules is like being in a club with its own language. And yet often the acronyms can be wrong or at least capable of being misunderstood or interpreted in different ways. It pays to put a glossary of acronyms to avoid this.
And even then the actual meaning has to be exact and understood. It’s like using the term “response time” to measure computer performance. The contract says the response time for a computer system to carry out a task must be say three seconds. But does that mean the time for a signal to go from one computer to another to commence the task? Or is it the time to complete the task. Here is a more complete definition:
The elapsed time between the end of an inquiry or demand on a computer system and the beginning of a response; for example, the length of the time between an indication of the end of an inquiry and the display of the first character of the response at a user terminal.
All of this is why in say an outsourcing contract defining and capturing the meaning of key terms – and then using them in the agreement is essential - even though it can be a meticulous and time-consuming task.
As Socrates said some two thousand five hundred years ago: “The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms.”
"Texting language" means the abbreviations and slang commonly used with mobile phone text messaging, or other Internet-based communication such as email. Here is a site with a comprehensive list of these acronyms for those less familiar with them.
In texting as in anything else misunderstandings can be unfortunate and illustrate the importance of exact understanding. If a friend texts asking for support in a time of personal crisis and you text back LOL thinking it means Lots of Love, you will not be popular.
The same is equally true but more so in contracts. TLA’s (that’s Three Letter Acronym’s) are often used with abandon in many IT agreements and in their negotiation. Discussing the technical schedules is like being in a club with its own language. And yet often the acronyms can be wrong or at least capable of being misunderstood or interpreted in different ways. It pays to put a glossary of acronyms to avoid this.
And even then the actual meaning has to be exact and understood. It’s like using the term “response time” to measure computer performance. The contract says the response time for a computer system to carry out a task must be say three seconds. But does that mean the time for a signal to go from one computer to another to commence the task? Or is it the time to complete the task. Here is a more complete definition:
The elapsed time between the end of an inquiry or demand on a computer system and the beginning of a response; for example, the length of the time between an indication of the end of an inquiry and the display of the first character of the response at a user terminal.
All of this is why in say an outsourcing contract defining and capturing the meaning of key terms – and then using them in the agreement is essential - even though it can be a meticulous and time-consuming task.
As Socrates said some two thousand five hundred years ago: “The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms.”
RSS Feed
