Naomi Baron's "Always On - Language in an Online and Mobile World"

Following closely (conceptually) on the heels of Nicholas Carr's "The Shallows" is Naomi Wolf's "Always On - Language in an Online and Mobile World". Unlike Carr's Cassandra-ish view of the Internet's effect on our brain functioning, Baron asks a different and more limited question - is Internet communication and mobile communication creating a new language? In sum, her answer is "no", though she admits that certain phrases (LOL, LMAO, et al) may indeed find their way into the Oxford English Dictionary or some other arbiter of "official" language.  Her viewpoint is linguistic and narrow (full disclosure - I love linguistics but know that it's not a topic for everyone) and the book gets highly technical (she advises the reader at the outset that she may wish to skip several chapters in toto). Nonetheless the question is a fascinating one - does the electronic mediation of language affect its substance? Well, language exists (purists notwithstanding) to communicate ideas, and it is continuing to do so even if reduced to acronyms, IMHO.  But there can be little denying a variation on a McLuhanesque argument - the medium affects the message. The sheer volume of electronic communication, in shorter and shorter bursts, means that we are talking more but saying less. The art of creating long-form arguments and essays is being affected (adversely) by the rise of shorter, eye-catching phrases and memes. Our concern about appearing well-written and erudite is dissipating. The mass of electronic language (and especially its social component) is disintermediating the authority of "correct" language. In her most cogent chapter, she refers to the rise of the "whatever" generation, characterized by a cavalier attitude toward far too many things - should proper language not be one of them?  Will language be subject to a linguistic equivalent of Gresham's law (bad money chases out good)? Baron is too smart to be definitive on this - all languages are constantly evolving, shifting meaning and orthography. She makes an impassioned case for the survival of a written culture, without falling fully into the trap of "print nostalgia". Data are not yet in (though what is in is not encouraging) for the decline in overall writing quality among students 6-12 and undergrad, the digital natives.  It will certainly be worse than 20 years ago, but may still not yet be a cause for worry - ya know?