I prefer it when people use whole words and sentences. I've never understood that online chat or posting was supposed to be a race. I thought the idea was to communicate and make connection with others. I even try to use proper grammar, if for no other reason than it helps those who are not native English speakers. (Don't bother quoting fmistakes from previous posts; I know that I don't do as well as I would prefer.
) After more than a year posting on forums, I still have problems with abbreviations for common phrases. How do you learn what they mean if everybody who "knows" is already abbreviating them? (AFAIK?)