[Nattybumppo]

Originally Posted by Nyororin

Whoa... Your other explanations were sort of alright, but this one is totally off the mark.

ってば has absolutely nothing to do with names. It`s just adding emphasis.

Yeah, you're entirely right! I had some sort of brainfart and was entirely thinking of ったら. (If you look at the quote I used to demonstrate it you can see this too.) D'oh!

Thanks for catching that though. You're right about ってば.

Originally Posted by shinjitsu

this leads me to another question. i have very often seen something like "verbて-form+る" like in "ねてるの". it seems to be a shortened version of "Vて+いる" in spoken japanese, at least the meaning seems to be similar. am i right?

Yep, you're right. It's a shortened form of ている. If a の follows it, it might contract again; ねているの →　ねてるの　→　ねてんの