Forecast

Taking into consideration the ongoing development of the digital

media (mobile phones, chat services, emails, internet in general) and

inclination of society to globalization, there is obviously a need for

informal communication with face-to-face terms directly, easily and

fast. For several years already, linguistic phenomena have been established

that serve this need to a large extent. This includes abbreviations

for speed, images and emoticons for directness and symbolic

expressions which give the group using them a feel of uniqueness.

Even though many are opposed to this kind of language transformations,

the users have already set a course which leads to constant

new communication phenomena. In the future, the need for direct

communication will be essential among people and the use of international

english will not be enough. The linguistic phenomena mentioned

were not designed and consolidated by competent bodies but

are created by ordinary users of the digital media. This is precisely

why this will continue to evolve, although it is seemingly informal

and unsupported. It is just another part of human evolution, in the

context of communication.

Having these into consideration, we could make the following

predictions for the next 10 years:

• The digital communication continues to be refined by users and

the need will continue to be more demanding

• The linguistic phenomena mentioned are acceptable even to users

who were originally opposed and are now acceptable collectively,

since they have been improved over time

• An international digital language is created, within the digital

media boundaries, that is being used daily to serve users’

needs globally

• Digital media evolve further and make communication easier,

faster and more direct than ever by incorporating super fast video

technology almost everywhere, eliminating the need for text and

chat messaging