The medium of Netspeak 61
features are and how many such dialects can be distinguished. An
initial enquiry into each of the main Internet situations provides
the subject-matter of chapters 4–7. However, it is also likely, given
the constraints that come from everyone using a broadly similar
computer technology and having a broadly similar set of motiva-
tions, that there will be a set of shared linguistic features, found
regardless of the Internet situation. The extent to which such a
‘common core’ exists is the subject of chapter 3.