Everybody has texted their friends or lovers ‘heyyy’ one time or another, but how much does it matter to add extra (grammatically unnecessary) letters when texting? In this article, we will dive  into this literacy phenomenon of online dating. Elongated words seem to carry a first order indexicality in the online dating world, with open interpretation and confusion about the message on the receiver’s end as a result. By analyzing real-life examples of user’s attitudes, and by taking into account some opinions online toward the phenomenon, we want to discuss the use and meaning of “heyyy”. Furthermore, we want to show that literacy (and the way we type a given world) has repercussions on something that may be perceived far away from literacy, such as online dating.

https://www.diggitmagazine.com/papers/does-length-matter