What's up with the ellipses in posts?

[Bert McMahan]

I see people typing posts sometimes with lots of ellipses in them (the little "...") in place of punctuation. Is that a new thing I'm just stumbling across? The posts will have one sentence.... then go on into another...

Then a new line will start, and they might have a question? Then they make a guess at the answer... but then again they might be wrong...

Is this a Facebook thing or something?

[Bill Dufour]

Herb Caen used them a lot. It indicates end of a thought or paragraph but to save column space in a daily column I will not do a proper end of paragraph and indent next one. This might allow one extra paragraph in a full column of a newspaper. Herb Caen is credited with inventing "three dot journalism"
It also indicates the writer knows his statement is incomplete and may not be grammatically correct but he has to meet a deadline so He will live it that way for now to be corrected if time allows.
Of course text rules may mean something completely different which I know nothing about.
Bill D

https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/02/some-three-dot-journalism-in-honor-of-herb-caen/252489/

[John K Jordan]

I see people typing posts sometimes with lots of ellipses in them . . . Is that a new thing I'm just stumbling across? . . .

Ellipses are a quite old punctuation construct with several specific and somewhat different purposes.

I use them on forums mostly to indicate some text of a quote has been omitted, usually to include just part of the quote to focus on what is relevant.

I use them very rarely as a pause, perhaps to trail off a sentence and imply thought or the need for thought.

Any grammar or style guide will discuss ellipses. For example, this one seems fairly complete: http://www.thepunctuationguide.com/ellipses.htm
I think the examples they use for quoted material are good. But it looks like I've been writing them wrong for a while. That guide reminded me the periods need spaces between them, like this . . . instead of this ...

Here is probably more than you ever wanted to know, from the worlds most trusted reference work, Wikipidia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellipsis

JKJ

[Carlos Alvarez]

Ellipses are punctuation. They are very useful...when properly used....

Also, it's more appropriate to use a three-dot mid-sentence and four at the end.

[Jim Becker]

When I use them, it's to provide a "pause", so that the reader can "hear" what it might sound like if I was saying it directly. And yea, sometime I over use them.... LOL

[Marshall Harrison]

I used them in a post to get around the minimum character count.

I tried to reply "Thanks" to someone this morning on SMC for wishing me happy birthday but the forum software said my reply was short of the 10 character minimum. So I added ellipses - "Thanks...."

[Bert McMahan]

Ellipses are a quite old punctuation construct with several specific and somewhat different purposes.

I use them on forums mostly to indicate some text of a quote has been omitted, usually to include just part of the quote to focus on what is relevant.

I use them very rarely as a pause, perhaps to trail off a sentence and imply thought or the need for thought.

Any grammar or style guide will discuss ellipses. For example, this one seems fairly complete: http://www.thepunctuationguide.com/ellipses.htm
I think the examples they use for quoted material are good. But it looks like I've been writing them wrong for a while. That guide reminded me the periods need spaces between them, like this . . . instead of this ...

Here is probably more than you ever wanted to know, from the worlds most trusted reference work, Wikipidia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellipsis

JKJ

Oh I'm familiar with how ellipses are normally used mid-sentence and to provide a trailing thought. I just see several posts on there whose ONLY punctuation for a whole paragraph is a bunch of ellipses used between regular sentences.

[Carlos Alvarez]

A lot of people have very poor English skills, or simply don't care to try. That's just the way the world has always been, and it's getting worse.

[John Redford]

I used them in a post to get around the minimum character count.

I tried to reply "Thanks" to someone this morning on SMC for wishing me happy birthday but the forum software said my reply was short of the 10 character minimum. So I added ellipses - "Thanks...."

Marshall wins the interwebz...today.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Marshall wins the interwebz...today.

True.

Er, I mean...true....

[Marshall Harrison]

Marshall wins the interwebz...today.

Thanks....

[Harold Balzonia]

It's a modern phenomenon. In a chat room, or forum, an ellipse is mostly used as a "soft stop." It provides the reader a chance to read the text with a pause, as in conversation. Hard periods are often read as "harsh" when that's the last thing the writer intended. A casual ellipse (in theory) softens the statement and makes it more conversational.

They are also used at the end of a written thought or opinion with the reader in mind to then interject their own opinion on said thought. Sort of like writing "think about it" without sounding rude.

Exclamation points are also used haphazardly in chat rooms in order to convey levity.

Punctuation in these types of forums is an ever-changing beast. The punctuation rules of essays and such are always welcome in my opinion, but in informal settings such as this, they can convey haughtiness.

Nobody wants that....

[Rick Potter]

I confess to being a heavy user, used to indicate a pause...to replicate the tempo of the spoken word.

[Larry Frank]

Poor English...

Haughtiness....

Interesting but does it really matter.....

I look for content and not grammar.

[Carlos Alvarez]

When the grammar makes it hard to understand the content, that makes it worthless.