A shorthand method of spelling found on many British academic
bulletin boards and {talker system}s. Syllables and whole words in a
sentence are replaced by single ASCII characters the names of which
are phonetically similar or equivalent, while multiple letters are
usually dropped. Hence, `for' becomes `4'; `two', `too', and `to'
become `2'; `ck' becomes `k'. "Before I see you tomorrow" becomes "b4
i c u 2moro". First appeared in London about 1986, and was probably
caused by the slowness of available talker systems, which operated on
archaic machines with outdated operating systems and no standard
methods of communication.
Hakspek almost disappeared after the great bandwidth explosion of the
early 1990s, as fast Internet links wiped out the old-style talker
systems. However, it has enjoyed a revival in another medium -- the
Short Message Service (SMS) associated with GSM cellphones. SMS sends
are limited to a maximum of 160 characters, and typing on a cellphone
keypad is difficult and slow anyway. There are now even published
paper dictionaries for SMS users to help them do hakspek-to-English
and vice-versa.
See also {talk mode}.
[glossary]
[Reference(s) to this entry by made by: {Commonwealth Hackish}{talk mode}]