IGSC – Some Random Snippets

I’ve decided that I’m going to resurrect IGSC (I Get So Confused). This was the first example of what would now be “l33t” speak that I learned…oh, I guess it must have been around 1984 or so (though the spoken form I’d heard A LOT in high school in the late ’70s). Yeah, this was before the public Internet, when Usenet was the high tech thing that was only available at research places and some government installations. Even the common smiley emoticon wasn’t often seen in the wild, yet, having only been “officially” born around 1983 or so.

I mostly saw IGSC on Fidonet. This was an international network was that tied together not so much by coaxial cable as it was phone lines. It was an interesting low-rent version of the Internet — well, low rent for U.S. users as most tended to have unlimited local calling, and thus could stay connected to local hubs without incurring time fees from the teleco. For the masses that didn’t have access to the fancy-schmancy Inter-/Usenet, this (and other home-brewed networks) were all we had to stay in touch…at 300bps.

IGSC was both actual and ironic. It could mean that you were actually confused about whatever the convo was, or it could relate to the fact that you weren’t confused but commenting on how something else was so stupid it was beyond belief. For example: Texter1: It was reported that McCain picked a woman for his running mate. Texter2: Great! Texter1: He picked Sarah Palin. Texter2: IGSC!

I should also mention that cows were also big at the time. Gary Larson’s cartoon, The Far Side, was all the rage for humor, and his imagery often involved cows. Derived from that was a very short, but very powerful word that was almost as ubiquitous as IGSC: “moo”. Yes…”moo” (usually in lowercase). It’s more of a punctuation/exclamation than anything else, sort of like: “day-um”, “huh”, or “fo’ shizzle”.  To continue with the previous example: …picked Sarah Palin. Texter2: IGSC! Texter1: I’ll vote for him, now! Texter2: moo

“moo” was always a little squirelly; for while IGSC was usually contextually obvious, “moo” was often intentionally ambiguous. Neither agreeing, nor disagreeing, but simply commenting. Which sort of makes sense…after all, whenever I talked to a cow, I hardly ever got a straight answer.

So, I’m announcing, today the rebirth of “IGSC” and also “moo” as useful ‘net idioms. Like a phoenix from the ashes, these words now are again flying free!

IGSC

moo