This article needs to be updated. The reason given is: Sources are all from the 2000s so this article does not document modern usage and includes information that is no longer relevant.(March 2021) |
LOL, or lol, is an initialism for laughing out loud,[1][2][3][4] and a popular element of Internet slang, which can be used to indicate amusement, irony, or double meanings.[5] It was first used almost exclusively on Usenet, but has since become widespread in other forms of computer-mediated communication and even face-to-face communication. It is one of many initialisms for expressing bodily reactions, in particular laughter, as text, including initialisms for more emphatic expressions of laughter such as LMAO[6] ("laughing my ass off") and ROFL[7][8][9] or ROTFL[10][11] ("rolling on the floor laughing").
In 2003, the list of acronyms was said to "grow by the month",[8] and they were collected along with emoticons and smileys into folk dictionaries that are circulated informally amongst users of Usenet, IRC, and other forms of (textual) computer-mediated communication.[12] These initialisms are controversial, and several authors[13][14][15][16] recommend against their use, either in general or in specific contexts such as business communications. The Oxford English Dictionary first listed LOL in March 2011.[17]
Haig2001
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was invoked but never defined (see the help page).