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The National Weather Service is making a change 167 years and many well-oiled caps lock keys in the making.
The forecasting agency announced Monday it will begin releasing weather warnings in standard mixed-case characters, ending the tradition of issuing standard updates in all caps.
The weather service began its all caps tendencies in 1849 “when weather reports were sent by ‘the wire’ over teleprinters,” the NWS said in a statement. The teleprinters were only able to use upper case characters and the standards were not updated when the agency switched to modern technology.
Past efforts to adopt mixed-case messages throughout the 1990s failed to gain widespread acceptance.
However, amateur weather forecasters experiencing some angst over the more pleasant tone need not fear. The NWS will still release some all caps messages during “extremely dangerous situations” and during forecasts with “international implications.”
Light rain on Thursday, however, will cease to be apocalyptically emphasized “LIGHT RAIN ON THURSDAY.”
The change will go into effect on May 11.
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Source: Huffingtonposts
