I bought the domain name today. I put it off long enough. Everything else I wanted was taken, of course, so I just went with my name. I'm a dork.

Silver displayed her, and she was pleased with her mild way:
the wrists—thin, pale stripes transparent without weight.
Her precise, metallic touch little by little rides runny as she traces.
Ferris wheels ride loop-the-loop around her bare axis arms;
Shiny, sticky charcoal curls of her mane bound and rebound.
Overcast eyes see nothing!
Her dry throat sucks and spits air in her dynamic surprise.
There is abruptly a future, a spill of rude insights and wide assumptions.
A striped window makes her a slick zebra
with natural bumps of pallid gloss.
Her creaks crack musically sweet in tune with the tugs of her thought
and the tow of her heart.
His hostile bulk.

If you're like me, and I know I am, you use some type of instant messenger. When and if you do, you have a choice before you. When someone says something that you find funny, you must either use "lol" (laugh out loud) or any number of "ha"s. The solitary use of Lol is usually reserved for children 15 or less and anyone with a below average IQ. If one of your friends uses lol regularly, you can safely bet they've read three or less books. Lol was dominant in the later half of the nineties with the sudden widespread availability/popularity of the Internet. It has since been proven inferior. For starters, it has little variance and expandibility. Any branch of language with an uncertain base value is sure to fail. The only widely accepted higher level versions are "lmao" and "rotflmao", which mean "laughing my ass off" and "rolling on the floor laughing my ass off", respectively. With the exception of these two, it is often much more difficult to tell exactly what the other person means as opposed to if they were using has. Some people use lol with absolutely anything they think is supposed to be meant as amusing. On the other hand, some only use it when they actually laugh out loud, restricting the conversation and possibly impeding communication. In either situation, both parties have lost something.

The use of ha can be thought of as a spectrum, stretching from 0 to infinity. This provides a great advantage over lol because it is much easier to implement, and is also much more clear; what you actually mean is more obvious. When dealing with a comical situation, time is very important. If you are fumbling to spell out "rotflmao" you may waste valuable, irreplaceable slivers of time. This can (and most likely will) hinder the conversation.

Here is a graphical representation of the Ha Spectrum with a corresponding explanation below. This is simply a guide. There are no universal values associated with each, but the majority would accept my gatherings as true.

Number	What they mean	Explanation
1:	"Eh, here's a courtesy laugh."	One ha is usually never a good sign. Whoever you are communicating with finds what you said completely unfunny and may even be insulted. Don't ever say anything like that again.
2:	"Heh, amusing."	This is the standard replacement for "lol". However, it doesn't necessarily mean the person really laughed.
3:	"Nice. I actually almost laughed out loud."	They found it fairly funny, but despite what you may think, they probably did not laugh aloud.
4:	"That was pretty funny!"	Four is good. This means you actually said something funny.
5:	"You silly bastard, I actually laughed."	Chances are now high enough to bet they laughed aloud. Five is your main goal. If you can squeeze five out of them, you're doing rather well.
6:	"You should say things like that more often. Man, good one."	You've broken the barrier. There is no doubt whether your comment was humorous.
7:	"Wow. My cheeks are hurting."	You made them laugh, and you've kept them laughing.
8:	"You're killing me here."	This is where the tides really turn. If you can bring them to eight, you've done your job well. This is the equivalent of "lmao".
9:	"Holy crap that was funny! This is going in my info."	At this point you may want to check for sarcasm. Nine is the rarest of them all, even though it's not the highest. If genuine, be proud.
10:	"I just spit all over the screen. Bravo!"	"ROTFLMAO!". Congratulations. You've reached the pinnacle of Hadom. You can now relax and not even worry about the rest of the conversation.

Anything after 10 is unnecessary and doesn't increase the value, but merely indicates the length of the laughter or amusement.

In our language, inflection is key. This holds true for communication over the Web. In addition to the information above, it is very important to consider capitalization. If the has received are in capital form then you can double the value. Here is an example:

HAHA = hahahaha

This again emphasizes the flexibility and customization as compared to the very limited use of lol.

Lol is not entirely useless. Some have chosen to combine lol and ha-. The best example of this is as follows. Lol is used only when the person did, in fact, laugh out loud. Any other time, has are used to reflect the fact that something was amusing, but failed to result in actual laughter. This method is quite effective in practical terms, but has yet to gain popularity. This is due to the fact that most people have strong opinions about each, and hold on tightly to their choice. This is, after all, a very important issue.