New to blogging? Just joined Twitter? No idea what’s going on? Need to know what it’s all about? Well, you haven’t come to the right place, but hey, while you’re here…

When I recently started blogging I was clueless, still am, so I thought I’d compile a cheat sheet of blogging and Twitter terms. Here it is… drum roll please…

bigwords’ Blogtwitionary of Terms Necessary To Navigate The World
Of Blogging and Twittering In This, The Year of 2011.

Blog – A self-indulgent forum to write about yourself and your thoughts or a place to flog products often for little, or no, monetary reward.

Grab my button – No, don’t “grab my button” only my husband is allowed to do that. This is when you have your logo on your blog and you encourage others to put a copy of it on their blog. When one of their readers presses on it in curiosity they are instantly taken from their blog to your blog. Hey presto, you steal them away. Ingenious! I have not worked out how to do that yet, but watch out because one day I will or I might just sit back and have a gin instead.
Linky MckLinky (aka Linky Tools or Mr Linky MckSlinky) – Some way skinny dude called MckLinky set up a system which allows people to join in on your themed blog post and by doing so your blog post is then “linked” to another’s and so forth. This is designed to introduce your blog to new readers and attract new followers. Actually, it’s not that exciting, I just like the name of it. It’s slinkalicious. 
Blog Hop – It’s a little dance you do when you’ve finally finished your latest blog post or it’s when you jump on the bandwagon of another blogger’s great idea. A list of the blogs participating in the blog hop appear at the bottom of your blog post so you, and your readers, can ignore them or if polite, and have time on your hands, can read them. Seriously though, who has time on their hands?

Trolls – People (of limited intelligence and with lots of time on their hands) who think bloggers (with limited patience for arseholes and no time on their hands) actually care about what their little narrow-minded brains think. 

Twitter – A self-deprecating forum in which to desperately chase the attention of others or a place to vent, laugh and share or a virtual pub where people who no longer leave the house at night can drink alone, but feel like they aren’t. Depending on how I am feeling about myself at the time, or how drunk I am, I can fall into all three categories.

Followers – People who read your blog posts or, in this instance, tweets. Generally, you follow each other, but if they don’t follow you back I suppose you are bordering on stalker behaviour. A little bit like when you tweet people and they completely ignore you. So, you tweet them again because you think maybe they didn’t get your tweet or Twitter “lost” their reply or or or… Imagine standing in a room with someone who kept talking at you, but then when you responded they ignored you, but still they continued to talk at you. I give up, I can’t explain that behaviour – it is simply rude.

RT – Re-Tweet. You don’t need to know about this if you never write anything remotely interesting or funny, but if you do, someone might RT your message to their list of followers on Twitter. By doing so, others, who do not know you, may wish to read more of your witty banter and become a follower of yours on Twitter. More followers mean more people to bore and visa versa.

DM – The abbreviation for a Direct Message, similar in part to an email. It is only shared between yourself and the sender. It’s a private way for someone to bitch about others or to share private details with you. All of this bonding is still limited to 140 characters and is also limited to people who follow each other. It is all too common to see a tweet: “Tried to DM you, but you do not follow me”. This can be awkward and everyone can witness it, which also makes it embarrassing. The simple fact is, sometimes Twitter just un-follows people on your behalf without you knowing it. And sometimes you aren’t following someone, but you truly thought you were, and sometimes, well… ahem…

Tweeps – People who you send to and receive tweets from. It’s sort of like your crew, your virtual mates, people who follow similar people to you, aka your homies.

Stabby – This is a term people who are menstruating use to describe the emotional roller coaster of hormonal imbalances in their body. It is often used in a sentence such as: “I want to stab my husband” or  “The person who looked at me at the shops today made me want to stab them”.

: ) – This is a smiley face. Do I really need to explain that?
*…* – Insert whatever you want between the stars to describe what you are doing or thinking, for example: * shakes head and laughs at the person who didn’t know what the smily face was *, *thinks to myself how that person used to be me *, * stops laughing  : ( *.

Tweavesdrop – This is when other people on Twitter are going about their own business and having a “private” discussion amongst themselves in a very public arena and then someone else joins in which is the whole point of Twitter. Quite often their incredibly vibrant, witty and intelligent comment will be preceded with * tweavesdropping * to indicate that they are fully aware they are BUTTING IN!


Meh – I actually still have no idea what this means. Whatever.

LOL – Laugh Out Loud. Not, Lots Of Love (which could be awkward if used in the wrong context, eg: “Sorry to hear you lost your job LOL”). And nor does it mean, Likes A Lot, like I used to think. I don’t even know how I came to that conclusion – the acronym does not match in ANY WAY.

ROFL – Rolls On Floor Laughing. I don’t think I’ve ever done that, but wouldn’t it be funny if people who wrote that were actually rolling around the floor laughing? Imagine, you were watching someone at a coffee shop tapping away quietly on their lap top and then “BAM” they are on the ground rolling around laughing. Freak!

PMSL – Pissing My Self Laughing. Now imagine, if someone actually pissed themselves. Ok, don’t.

FTW – For The Win or as I like to think, Fuck The World. I think it’s up to you to decide which way to go on this one. I’m definitely in the camp for the latter. No surprises there.

IRL –  This one took me ages to work out and I was too shy to ask. No, it isn’t a computer reference, like URL, but it could relate. It means In Real Life, like: “I am a sexy bitch, but IRL I am butt ugly”. I suppose URL could mean Un Real Life, which pretty much sums up the blogging and Twitter community. It’s a life away from your life; an escape. It’s fun and when you need it, it’s really supportive. Just watch out though, as some people take it a bit more seriously than others.

Have you got any words to add to the list?

* bigwords has a Facebook Page, please come and check it out and click like, if you like!