AP updates style book to include “tweet”

Australian Press have updated their style guide for journalists to include social media guidelines, adding terms such as “retweet”, “unfriend”, “defriend” and “trending”.

Forty-one new rules and definitions were included in the new release of the Stylebook, including the official change of “web site” to “website”.

Among other additions, the words fan, follow and friend can now officially be used as both nouns and verbs, “smart phone” became two words and “e-reader” was hyphenated.

The rulebook has also defined a number of acronyms that are commonly used in texting and instant messaging.

ROFL which is short for “rolling on the floor laughing”, BRB short for “be right back”, and G2G which stands for “got to go” are among the definitions that journalists can now use.

The first AP Stylebook was produced in 1953 and was total of 60 pages long. The new digital version has grown to 450 pages and is updated annually.

AP also provides some basic rules for how social media should and shouldn’t be used by journalists.