The term “ig” on TikTok means “I guess”, and was spawned by leading TikTokker, Addison Rae back in July of this year.
The use of abbreviated slang on social media is aimed at conveying a message with the least number of characters possible.
However, the use of abbreviated slang can be traced even further back. Think back to the days of texting and beepers. In light of the continued advances in communication technology, abbreviated slang words have also come and gone.
Moreover, even those that have stayed, they too have experienced a change in meaning.
For instance, the use of the abbreviation, “ig.” Going back as early as the late 1990s into the early 2000s, the term was used in texting language to say, “I guess.”
This is as the term was popular amongst the millennials, with the influence of high school films which were popular at the time.
However, things quickly changed with the beginning of the 2010s and the launch of Instagram in October 2010.
The consequence of the growing popularity of the now leading social media app was that the term was subverted to exclusively refer to Instagram.
Since the popularity of Instagram and the introduction of emojis as a medium of communication, “ig” exclusively meant Instagram.
Therefore, to suggest the same intention as the 2000s “ig”, social media users resolved to using the rolling eyes emoji instead.
However, in July 2021, leading TikTokker, Addison Rae revised the meaning once again through a tweet.
This was after TikTok experienced some technical difficulties which resulted in Rae taking to Twitter to share a screenshot showcasing that she had lost all her followers, captioning it, “Time to get a job ig.”
Which was understood to mean, “Time to get a job, I guess.” Since then, the term has once again taken its original meaning, especially for avid TikTok users.
