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u = you
oic = Oh, I see. l8r = later u2 = you too LOL = laughing out loud ROFL = rolling on the floor, laughing ROFLMAO = rolling on the floor, laughing my ass off imho = in my humble opinion |
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As you can see, words and phrases range from the mundane to the pointless. Come on. Who actually says "in my humble opinion"? And when people type "LOL" are they really laughing out loud? Probably not. Even the for the few that actually do laugh out loud, what about rolling on the floor? Honestly, how many times have you actually found yourself on the floor because you were laughing so hard? To make matters even more ridiculous, there's even an online dictionary that you can buy to look up what some of this crap means.
Now, we turn to the more sinister of the 12yearolds, the ones who have twisted this new form of speech even further - the online gamers! In the online gaming world, almost everything is abbreviated. If you don't abbreviate, you had might as well not be talking at all. On top of abbreviations, online gamers have developed a new dialect of netspeak, known as leetspeek (elite speak). In leetspeek, symbols are used more often and even worse, typos have become adopted as actual terms! Who the hell does that?!? Examples:
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l33t = leet = 1337 = elite (good)
l33t skillz = elite skills ("My skills are good.") pwnd = owned ("I killed you.") n00b = noob = newbie (a sign of disapproval; "Your skills are lacking.") r0x0r = roxor = rocks (a sign of approval) w00t = woot (a Homer Simpson-esque "woohoo") d00dz = doodz = dudes ("I'm cool, please love me.") |
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The following letter substitutions are common:
a => 4
e => 3
f => ph
i => 1 or |
l => | or 1
m => |\/|
n => |\|
o => 0
s => 5
t => 7 or +
Thus, "all your base are belong to us" becomes "4ll y0ur b4s3 4r3 b3l0ng t0 us".
Other less common substitutions include:
b => 8
c => ( or k or |< or /<
d => <|
g => 6 or 9
h => |-|
k => |< or /<
p => |2
u => |_|
v => / or \/
w => // or \/\/
x => ><
y => '/
The word "cool" is spelled "kewl" and normally used ironically; when gamers really want to praise something they use the prefix "uber" (from German) which comes out "ub3r" or even "|_|83r". Nonetheless, the whole thing is retarded. It took many brilliant people many years to perfect the English language. Please, quit butchering it with netspeak and leetspeek.
And don't even get us started on smileys. They're gay...'nuff said.
staff out...