Seriously, I hate them. It makes it seem like you don't have anything substantial when you use them. They appear as filler for a weak product. Talk to me like a human. Given that I'm trying to find other humans for work, I would rather trust something that felt honest than something peppered with marketing-speak.
That isn't a misspelling, but a very common shortcut. I fail to see how this in any way detracts from the readability of the text. Other shortcomings notwithstanding, "pls" is fine for the vast majority of internet users.
Generally in my life I've shared the same opinion... but are you sure that if A/B-tested, 'please' would outperform 'pls' in the context of Work.IO's goals?
For example: when soliciting user participation, it often helps to lower user anxiety that what is written needs to be perfectly crafted/grammatical. 'Txtspeek' can send a signal: it's OK whatever 'u' want to type here.
Love the idea for the site, and though it may be ahead of its time, it is an ambitious project and deserves to do well - one day a lot of work will be distributed this way.
However using txtspk like pls for talking to potential customers is not quicker or cool - it shows a lack of respect. Also, this error from zephyr has been on your home page for the last few hours:
Obvisously you want to keep your site and app secure, but who is really good at this? Zephyr comes from MIT and is the perfect interface to the Noisebridge community.
Simple spelling and grammatical errors on your site home like this will cost you credibility and customers; best just to fix them and move on. Your initial text, by you and your users, will set the tone for everything that follows.
That's ok on a forum, but not on a site that tries to appear professional and elegant (and buzzword-y). Personally, I also think the font used on the "About Us" page for "What you need" and so on does not mesh all that well with the rest of the site.
Seriously, I hate them. It makes it seem like you don't have anything substantial when you use them. They appear as filler for a weak product. Talk to me like a human. Given that I'm trying to find other humans for work, I would rather trust something that felt honest than something peppered with marketing-speak.