Exactly this. Language warps and changes over time, that's just how it works. The internet slang and abbreviations are just another dialect that's developed and which mostly makes sense only to the people who speak it. And of course, within this dialect there are lots of sub-groups, depending on what areas of the internet you frequent. I hadn't encountered GPOY before, but it would make a lot of sense in communities like tumblr and facebook that are very image-oriented. The anime groups borrow a lot of Japanese terms and shorthand. Online gaming has an entirely different set of acronyms and jargon.
It just seems overwhelming because what ordinarily would have taken a very long time to develop has, because of the speed of communication the internet allows, only taken 20 years or so. Also, I know there have been some studies done that show that some online communication (especially chatting/texting) is treated much more like conversation than written communication, the former being a place where people take many more linguistic shortcuts in any case.
It hasn't changed standard English, except by adding new words, but new words get added all the time anyway. I don't think that it's going to be acceptable to write formal papers in internet slang anytime soon, though.
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It just seems overwhelming because what ordinarily would have taken a very long time to develop has, because of the speed of communication the internet allows, only taken 20 years or so. Also, I know there have been some studies done that show that some online communication (especially chatting/texting) is treated much more like conversation than written communication, the former being a place where people take many more linguistic shortcuts in any case.
It hasn't changed standard English, except by adding new words, but new words get added all the time anyway. I don't think that it's going to be acceptable to write formal papers in internet slang anytime soon, though.