Information AboutLeet |
For other uses, see Leet (disambiguation) Leet (written as '''31337''', '''1337''', and '''l33t'''), or '''Leetspeak''', is a written form of Slang (technically an Argot ) used primarily on the Internet , but becoming increasingly common in many online Video Games ,Blashki & Nichol, 77-80. which uses various combinations of alphanumerics to replace proper letters. The term itself is a degenerative form of the word " Elite ", and the language it describes resembles a highly specialized form of electronic Shorthand . Initially, the word ''leet'' was used as an Adjective , to primarily describe the behavior or accomplishments of others in the community. In that usage, Leet generally carries the same meaning when referring to either the Game Prowess or, in original usage, Hacking Expertise of another person. From adjective form its use then expanded to include use as an Expletive in reaction to a demonstration of the former qualities. With the mass proliferation of Internet use in the 1990s into the 21st century, Leet has since become a part of Internet culture and slang.Mitchell. Leet may also be considered a substitution Cipher , albeit with much variation from user to user. HISTORY Leet originated within bulletin board systems in the 1980s ,An Explanation of l33t Speak. where having "elite" status on a BBS allowed a user access to file folders, games, and special chat rooms, often including archives of Pirated Software , Pornography , or text files documenting topics such as how to construct Explosives and manufacture Illegal Drugs .Sterling, 70. It was primarily developed to defeat text filters created by BBS or Internet Relay Chat System Operators for message boards to discourage the discussion of forbidden topics, like Cracking and Hacking . Once reserved to use by Hackers , Cracker s, and Script Kiddies , Leet has since entered the mainstream. It is now also used to mock Newbie s, or newcomers, on web sites, or in gaming communities.Rome. Some consider Emoticons and ASCII Art , like smiley faces, to be Leet, while others believe that Leet consists of only symbolic word encryption. More obscure forms of Leet, involving the use of symbol combinations and almost no letters or numbers, continue to be used for its original purpose of encrypted communication. It is also sometimes used as a script language.Google Directory. ORTHOGRAPHY One of the hallmarks of Leet is its unique approach to Orthography , using substitutions of other characters, letters or otherwise, to represent a letter or letters in a word.Blashki & Nichol, 80. The symbol chosen is flexible—anything that the reader can make sense of is valid. However, this practice is not extensively used in regular Leet, more often it is seen in situations where the Argot characteristics of the system are required, either to exclude newbies or outsiders in general. Another use for Leet orthographic substitutions is the creation of paraphrased passwords. By using this method, one can create a relatively secure password which would still be easily remembered. Limitations imposed by websites on password length (usually no more than 36) and the characters permitted (usually alphanumeric and underscore) requires less-extensive forms of Leet when used in this application. Some examples of Leet include: '' B1FF '', a term for the stereotypical Newbie ; the L33t Programming Language ; and the webcomic Megatokyo , which contains characters who speak Leet. MORPHOLOGY ;The ''-xor'' suffix The meaning of this suffix is similar to the more common ''-er'' and ''-r'' suffixes (seen in ''hacker'' and ''lesser''), in that they derive may also be Inflected with all of the suffixes of regular English Verbs . ;The ''-age'' suffix Derivation of a noun from a verb stem is possible by attaching ''-age'' to the base form of any verb. Attested derivations are ''pwnage'' and ''speakage''. However, Leet provides exceptions; the word ''leetage'' is acceptable, referring to actively being ''leet''.Blashki & Nichol, 79. ;The ''-ness'' suffix Derivation of a noun from an adjective stem is done by attaching ''-ness'' to any adjective. This is entirely the same as the English form, except it is used much more often in Leet. Nouns such as ''Uberness'' and ''leetness'' are derivations using this suffix. ;Words ending in ''-ed'' When forming a past participle ending in ''-ed'', the Leet user may replace the ''-e'' with an apostrophe, as was common in Poetry of previous centuries, (e.g. "pwned" becomes "pwn'd"). Note that the conventions of Leet allow for some misplaced punctuation, since it is assumed that the user is typing very quickly; therefore the apostrophe may shift its position without changing the word's meaning. The word ending may also be substituted by ''-t'' (e.g. ''pwned'' becomes ''pwnt'').LeBlanc, 33. ;Use of the ''-&'' suffix Words ending in ''-and'', ''-anned'', ''-ant'', or a similar sound can sometimes be spelled with an ampersand (''&'') to express the ending sound. This is most commonly used with the word ''banned'' (e.g. "This is the S&box , "I'm sorry, you've been b&", "&hill/&farm"). An alternate form of "B&" is "B7", as the ampersand is typed with the "7" key. It is often seen in the phrase "IBB7" (in before banned). GRAMMAR '' ( {Link without Title} ). Like other Hacker Slang , Leet enjoys a looser grammar than standard English . The loose grammar, just like loose spelling, encodes some level of emphasis, ironic or otherwise. A reader must rely more on intuitive Parsing of Leet to determine the meaning of a sentence rather than the actual sentence Structure . In particular, speakers of Leet are fond of Verbing nouns, turning verbs into nouns (and back again) as forms of emphasis, e.g. "Austin rocks" is weaker than "Austin r0xx0rz" (note spelling), which is weaker than "/\u571N is t3h r0xx0rz" (note grammar), which is weaker than something like "OMFG D00d /\u571N is t3h UBER 1337 R0XX0RZ". In essence, all of these mean "Austin rocks," not necessarily the other options. Added words and misspellings add to the speaker's enjoyment. Leet, like in other hacker slang, employs Analogy in construction of new words. For example, if ''haxored'' is the past tense of the verb "to hack" (hack → haxor → haxored), then ''winzored'' would be easily understood to be the past tense conjugation of "to win," even if the Reader had not seen that particular Word before. Leet has its own colloquialisms, many of which originated as jokes based on common typing errors, habits of new computer users, or knowledge of Internet culture and history.Blashki & Nichol, 81. Leet is not solely based upon one language or character set. " phrase. Indeed, the online and computer communities have been international from their inception, so spellings and phrases typical of non-native speakers are quite common. Rhyming and rhythm Care is taken by users of Leet to combine similarly timed words, or to encipher words into ways such that they have a common ). Other examples would be "roxorz your boxorz" (in this case, rhyming). Over-exclamation and other emphasis Another common feature of Leet is over-exclamation, where a Sentence is postfixed with many exclamation marks. In some cases, because the exclamation symbol (!) resides on the same key as the number one (1) on QWERTY keyboards, over-exclamation can be accidentally (or purposefully) typed with extraneous numerical digits, owing to the excitement of the typist (e.g. "This is really exciting!!11").Blashki & Nichol, 78. This was especially likely in the context of fast-paced online multiplayer games, where typing carefully leaves the gamer vulnerable to attack. Some deliberately type the numbers, while others take the exclamation further and sarcastically replace some of the digits with various written forms (e.g. " STFU !!11one"), or in cases of extreme sarcasm, another number (e.g. "OMG!!!!11!!11oneonesix"). The same applies for interrogative punctuation (e.g. "What are you talking about??//"). Other similar uses include the § (section), ~ (tilde) and @ keys, which are adjacent to the (1) key on various QWERTY keyboards; in extreme cases the exclamations may simply end with a string of garbage characters (e.g. " OMG !!!!!1!1!!!{`+{`+{`$#+%{&#"). In addition to variations on punctuation-based emphasis, it is common to combine two (or more) words and capitalize them to show emphasis. Perhaps most common would be the combination of ''OMG'' and ''WTF'' to produce ''OMGWTF''. As with most alternative Leet spellings or grammar, inclusion of these traits in a sentence is often done on purpose. The intent is typically to either lighten the mood, strengthen a point (by mocking someone who may not be privy to the discussion), or convey a sense of irony, depending on the context. VOCABULARY Many words originally derived from Leet slang have now become part of the modern Internet slang, such as " Pwn ed". The primary driving force of new vocabulary in Leet is the need to describe new phenomena. Another force is common misspelling and mistyping such as " Teh ", and intentional misspellings,Blashki & Nichol, 83. especially the "z" at the end of words ("skillz"). Another prominent example of a surviving Leet expression is '' W00t '', an exclamation of joy. New words (or corruptions thereof) may arise from a need to make one's username unique. As any given Internet service reaches more people, the number of names available to a given user is drastically reduced. While many users may wish to have the username "CatLover," for example, in many cases it is only possible for one user to have the moniker. As such, degradations of the name may evolve, such as "C@L0vr." As the Leet cipher is highly dynamic, there is a wider possibility for multiple users to share the "same" name, through combinations of spelling and transliterations. Additionally, ''leet''—the word itself—can be found in the Screennames and Gamertags of many Internet and video games. Use of the term in such a manner announces a high level of skill, though such an announcement is often untruthful.Computer Hope Dictionary. Terminology and Common misspellings '''', which represents a quality of superiority; it usually appears as a prefix attached to adjectives, and is frequently written without the Umlaut over the ''u''.Van de Velde & Meuleman. Haxor and Suxxor, or Suxorz ''Haxor'', and derivations thereof, is Leet for "hacker",LeBlanc, 30; 32. and it is one of the most commonplace examples of the use of the ''-xor'' suffix. ''Suxxor'' (pronounced suck-zor) is a derogatory term which originated in Warez culture and is currently used in multi-user environments such as multiplayer video games and Instant Messaging ; it, like ''haxor'', is one of the early Leet words to use the ''-xor'' suffix. ''Suxxor'' is a modified version of "sucks" (the phrase “to suck”), and the meaning is the same as the English Slang . Its negative definition essentially makes it the opposite of ''roxxor'', and both can be used as a verb or a noun. Kekeke In Hangul , the Korean written language, people express a laughter sound with repetitions of the character "ㅋ", similar to the "k" sound in English. Since early versions of StarCraft did not support Hangul, Korean players would use a Romanized spelling—hence, ''kekeke'' was born. The phrase is a phrase similar to the English and French "hahaha", Spanish "jajaja", Chinese "hehehe", or Japanese "fufufu"/"huhuhu". It is often used in-game as an expression of exaltation or as a form of mockery. Commonly, it is associated with the StarCraft tactic of a Zerg Rush , named after the StarCraft faction for whom the tactic was created. The phrase "Zerg Rush kekeke!" is sometimes used outside of the game to indicate any form of overwhelming or swarming force. ''Kekeke'' is also used as an Evil Laugh and is used by players using devious tactics and/or playing evil characters. While this usage is sometimes thought to have its roots in the laugh of Kefka , the main villain from Final Fantasy VI , ''kekeke'' is commonly associated with laughs of devious characters in Japanese Manga , Anime , and Video Games , and has made its way through various translations. The phrase also occurs on the MMORPG World Of Warcraft . There are two major factions in the game which 'speak' different languages. All chat text entered by a member of one faction will appear jumbled to a member of the other, and vice versa. As a result, members of the Alliance faction would see "kek" when a member of the Horde faction had typed "lol", while conversely a member of the Horde faction would see "bur" when a member of the Alliance faction had typed "lol". The cipher works a little differently for longer words though, and "hahaha" becomes "kekeke". Such terms have become widely understood amongst World of Warcraft players. This is also a good example of what is known as an Easter Egg in the game World of Warcraft. The game writers at Blizzard used hundreds of famous phrases and names in populating the game world, and KEK (Orcish for LOL) was intentional. LOL Among the earliest Internet slang terms is '' LOL '', an indication of appreciation of humor, literally meaning “''L''aughing ''O''ut ''L''oud” or “''L''ots ''O''f ''L''aughs”.LeBlanc, 72. It could also mean lots of love, but this is rare, if encountered at all in online culture.Haig, 89. Similar acronyms were quickly added to the lexicon, including ''ROFL'' (“''R''olling ''O''n the ''F''loor ''L''aughing”), ''LMAO'' (“''L''aughing ''M''y ''A''rse/''A''ss ''O''ff”), and the combination of the two; ''ROFLMAO'' ("''R''olling ''O''n the ''F''loor ''L''aughing ''M''y ''A''ss ''O''ff"). A more uncommon version of ROFL is FOFL meaning ''F''alling ''O''n ''F''loor ''L''aughing. Raymond & Steele, 435.LeBlanc, 73. Derivations of the acronym quickly became incorporated into the Leet vocabulary. LOL can also be displayed typed as ''lawl''. ROFL can also be combined with LOL—ROFLOL (''R''olling ''O''n the ''F''loor ''L''aughing ''O''ut ''L''oud). The word "lawl" is now starting to be used, which is the spelling of the pronunciation of lol as a word. More recently, "lol" has been popularized as a noun, most frequently seen pluralized as "lolz" or deliberately misspelled "lulz", as in "I did it just for the lulz". Noob Within Leet, the term '' Noob '', and derivations thereof, is used extensively. The word means, and derives from, ''newbie'' (as in new and inexperienced or uninformed), and is used as a means of segregating the "elite" members of a group from outsiders. Though they are often used interchangeably, there is a widely accepted separation of the definitions of ''newb'' and ''n00b'': a newb is a person who is new to something, while a ''n00b'' is a detestable or inferior person. It is used in a derogatory sense, implying the target is being ignorant of his or her own failures, blaming others without reason, failing to learn, etc. The word ''noob'' is a very common insult in most online games. In primitive Leet, as used on BBS systems in the 1980s and into the very early 1990s, the usual term was ''Christmas Kiddie''. ''Christmas Kiddie'' referred to the phenomenon where BBS systems were flooded with new members immediately following Christmas and Hanukkah because Modem s were a common holiday gift. If the kiddie was young, the term ''ruggie'' (derived from ''rugrat'' meaning ''child'') might be used; another variant was ''greenie'' or ''Christmas greenie'' which was derived from the cowboy slang ''greenhorn''. As the Internet evolved and Modem s saw a decline, the term ''Christmas Kiddie'' was shortened to just ''Kiddie'' with the meaning morphing slightly to indicate someone who did not know a lot about what they were doing online, and were just running scripts provided by other, more experienced users. This typically, but not necessarily, referred to children or ''noobs'' who had recently discovered the online world and were experimenting with various hacking scripts available. Owned and Pwned '' Owned '' and '' Pwned '' both refer to the domination of a player in a video game or argument (rather than just a win), or the successful hacking of a website or computer.LeBlanc, 32-33. For example, in a multiplayer First-person Shooter game, a player with a default starting Gun defeats an opponent carrying a vastly superior weapon. This would indicate dominant skill in the player with the inferior weapon, who outplayed (''owned'' or ''pwned'') the player with superior firepower. As in a common characteristic of Leet, the terms have also been adapted into noun and adjective forms, ''ownage'' and ''pwnage'', which can refer to the situation of ''pwning'' or to the superiority of its subject (e.g., "He is a very good player. He is pwnage."). Some people pronounce pwn as ''p'own'' or ''poon''. Since the letter ''p'' on a QWERTY keyboard is right next to the letter ''o'', it likely derives from a typographical error of '' Owned '', and was eventually embraced by Leetspeakers as an intentional misspelling; however, pwn is also sometimes said to mean "purely own" (pwnage could be "pure ownage").The Free Dictionary. Pr0n ''Pr0n'' or ''pron'' is Leet '', a pornographer films his movies on 'Prawn Island'. Conversely, in the RPG Kingdom Of Loathing , '' Prawn '', referring to a kind of Crustacean , is spelled ''pr0n'', leading to the creation of food items such as “pr0n chow mein”. SEE ALSO NOTES REFERENCES |
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