Good question.  Will speakers treat LOL as an acronym, pronounce to rhyme with either "call" or "poll," or as an initialism, like NBC or CIA?  Initialisms behave like compound words when it comes to taking affixes, and I suspect the variation between the two renderings will persist.  I wonder if upper vs. lower case has any influence on how it's pronounced, with 'lol" as an acronym and LOL as an initialism.

Herb

-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Dianne E Loyet
Sent: Tuesday, August 17, 2010 10:26 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Something I just had to share

Actually, what I heard (and should have written) was not something like "lolling" but "L-O-L-ing." I apologize for the lack of clarity in my post.

So there are two competing versions that people have heard--"lol" and "L-O-L" with grammatically needed affixes? I wonder which competing version will eventually dominate.

Dianne

----- Original Message -----
From: John Dews-Alexander <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Monday, August 16, 2010 3:28 pm
Subject: Re: Something I just had to share
To: [log in to unmask]


> Thanks for sharing, Dianne! I've discovered that actually saying "lol"
> (rhymes with "ball") is an effective shorthand in many circles (all
> youngish) for "What you just said was very funny, perhaps not enough 
> to make me truly laugh but I do recognize the humor and am 
> acknowledging it."
> That's
> my interpretation anyway based on hearing it in context.
> 
> Leave it to marketing departments to mine such usage! McDonald's has 
> long been a fun example for classroom explorations of marketing language.
> 
> I'm looking forward to looking up the example of "LOL-ing"!
> 
> John
> 
> On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 2:36 PM, Dianne E Loyet <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
> 
> > I just heard this on a McDonald's radio commercial and had to share:
> >
> > "I'm NOT LOL-ing."
> >
> > I'm lovin' it.
> >
> > Dianne
> >
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