Years ago, I remember a friend talking disdainfully about someone. “Can you believe she said LOL in real life instead of laughing?” It’s 2025 and yes, I can believe it. Not just for a person we describe as eccentric but for myself too.

If you maintain an online presence on any social media platform, chances are you have probably found yourself thinking of captions in ‘internet speak’. A language or a set of words we know an avid consumer of content online would understand – in fact, a language that maybe ONLY they would understand.

The internet is filled with videos of celebrities quizzed on their ‘Gen Z vocabulary’. However, the vocabulary they refer to – is it Gen Z speak or is it internet speak? A language that only a ‘chronically online’ person speaks or understands.

When we describe an outfit as ‘a slay!’ online, everyone understands it to mean that it is a gorgeous outfit.

Dictionaries might take a second to accept the implied meaning, but if the internet has decided a word means something, it means exactly that. With the volume of content, memes, videos and podcasts where that word is used – its absence in a dictionary hinders nothing.

Sometimes, the word doesn’t even have to mean anything. Take ‘skibidi,’ a word all Millennials fear. No one knows what it means but what if someone asks if you know what it means? According to the Urban Dictionary (an online dictionary that tackles internet slang), skibidi has no inherent meaning. It can be a nonsensical conversation starter or an adjective, depending on how it’s used.

What then does this mean for artists, writers and business owners who want to put their work on social media? Do they find their original expressions lost in the sea of similar-sounding captions or do they stand firm on a vocabulary not influenced by the internet and hope their community will still find them?

“The way you are supposed to present your work as an artist in the art world is a little formal,” says Shanzay Subzwari, a visual artist and art educator in Karachi. “This is how it retains its value and let’s say, its price.”

Subzwari feels her work, although shared on social media, doesn’t actively seek an online audience and can therefore be exhibited without resorting to internet speak. “The artwork I make is the kind that sells in art galleries and museums – all of which are frequented by an affluent older crowd that is not very internet savvy anyway.”

However, what if the success of your business depends on the number of people it reaches on social media?

Restaurants that want to present themselves as fine dining establishments find themselves trying to cope with the ever-increasing demands of the social media algorithm. Marya Khuhawar, who owns a cafe in Karachi called Marya’s Café, says, “There is pressure to stay relevant. Even when choosing who to hire for social media marketing, I have to consider their knowledge of internet speak. You can’t stay in your bubble and ignore
what is trending.”

Perhaps small businesses and restaurants have had to adapt the most to internet speak. Scrolling through the Instagram feeds of different restaurants, you would be hard-pressed to find one that has not used a ‘symphony of flavours’ to describe their food. Did different social media managers use the same phrase coincidentally or is this an example of internet speak taking control over one’s original expression, making everyone sound exactly
the same?

The use of AI tools like ChatGPT has not made it better. One of the more obvious signs that something has been written using AI is when it features repetitive words or phrases. In the context of social media content, this could mean that even more of what people express there will sound the same if reliance on AI grows.

One might ask if it is really a bad thing that everyone is using the same exact phrases to describe different situations. Saying “I am shook” instead of “I am surprised” or “taken aback” or “flustered.” It does make the canvas of our world sound a little less colourful and imaginative.

Some writers, artists and people who don’t directly rely on the internet seem to agree and are resisting the ‘sameness of online language.’

“I am not writing to appeal to a mass audience,” says Atiya Abbas, a communications specialist. “When I started using the internet, I was all for being nonchalant about what I say online but now I take it seriously.” Abbas says her focus is on communicating effectively instead of worrying about her message reaching a certain number of people on social media. Like Subzwari, she feels that sticking to her own expressions will help find people who resonate with it.

As Abbas says, “If my vocabulary or my words seem really big to you, go look them up in a dictionary.” It may be a case of just that.

Riffat Rashid is a food writer and a digital content creator behind the blog, GirlGottaEat.
girlgottaeat17@gmail.com