Rhetoric 201

One of the underreported dark sides to T9 predictive text entry on cell phones (at least, on my cellphone) is the way it handles user-edited entries. I've found that, for instance, I've had to enter contractions manually since for some reason "im" is not recognized my default. I dealt with it, since the alternative is digging through another couple of menus to get an apostrophe added, or saying "i am," which of course is way too much work.

You get reminded of this when you try to write digits into a text message. If you press "4," for instance, and then start clicking up to find the actual 4, you also get a list of everything you've custom-edited that begins with either G, H or I. On my phone, when you press 3, you see:

3
Fracking
Dammit
FUCK
Fuck
Duck