Words and language in the news during the week ending Jan 10: a fading dialect; a strange code with Mafia ties; a new trend in South Korean baby-naming; “strategic sloppiness” in professional communications; a congressman with a punctuation plan; and more …

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Missouri’s paw-paw French language dialect is fading into silence; Al Jazeera has the story.

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Police in Italy say they have deciphered a mysterious coded text that appears to reveal the details of a secretive mafia initiation process, according to a BBC report.

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Is “strategic sloppiness” a new way of communicating professionally? According to a piece in Linked In Today, it is. New York magazine writer Kevin Roose explains how spelling mistakes and bad e-mail etiquette can help you get ahead.

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The Los Angeles Times asked the question “Does grammar matter?” Read the article to discover the paper’s verdict …

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“Yahoo malware creates Bitcoin botnet” was one of the BBC News headlines today. How 21st-century is that?

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Roll Call describes how Congressman Jared Polis, the Colorado Democrat, has a plan to streamline overly worded thoughts — with tildes.

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Parents in South Korea are ignoring traditions and choosing baby names that are easy for foreigners to pronounce. Arirang News, a South Korean broadcaster, says names that are easier to pronounce in English are gaining popularity. The BBC gives more detail.