Vicki's Reviews > Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language

I'm of two minds about this book. On the one hand, the author's passion and enthusiasm for the topic clearly shines through. She knows the world she navigates and deftly cites current memes, Tumblr posts, and all the relevant current internet zeitgeist like emojis to bring the reader up to speed on what internet language is. She also has an interesting framework for understanding emojis as an extension of our physical selves online, and about different categories of "internet people" based on how "online" they are. There are other morsels that are great food for thought, as well, and my copy has quite a few highlights.

However, a couple things could have been done much better in this book. First, it feels very disjoint. There is no common theme, no narrative, it seems pulled together from different blog posts (which I think it was?.) It's very easy to get lost in the minutiae and not form a comprehensive theory of what's going on. Second, it's hard to get a sense for who exactly the audience is. The tone at times is extremely academic, so is it for researchers? Sometimes it's super-informal, so is it for people like me, who spend most of their time online and already know most of this stuff? And sometime it's very defensive and explanatory, so is it for those who don't understand or appreciate the power of the internet? I think it has to cater to the largest possible demographic who will buy it, and that's a shame, because the book ends up catering to no one in particular.