×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

(OP)
Sorry if this is way off-topic, but it's Friday!

Being of a younger generation than the average here, I feel obliged to help out with the inevitable obsolescence that comes with age.  I'm speaking here of l33tspeak, the slang language employed by teenagers, hackers, gamers, and programmers alike.  I'll also cover the lesser variants employed in chat programs such as AIM.

To my knowledge, it evolved out of multiplayer online games where action and decision take precedence over grammar and punctuation.  There are various codes used depending upon the game in question, but the standards everybody knows -

afk = away from keyboard
brb = be right back
lol = laughing out loud

moving on -

l33t = elite, skilled
n00b = newbie, freshman, unskilled, fresh meat
pwned = derivation of powned, itself a derivation of owned - meaning to thoroughly beat somebody (perhaps a derivation from slavery?), also 0wn3d
teh - the (don't ask)

Examples:

|-|3 pwn3d teh n00bs but not l33t!!
(He may have beaten the newcomers, but is not as skilled as we.)

Those are the basics I think - if anybody has specific questions I'll be happy to field them.  Also there's a pretty nice site out there - www.urbandictionary.com - which is basically a Wiki-dictionary.  Unfortunately you'll learn too, Too much about sexual slang on that site as well.  

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

I fail to see how using a 3 instead of the letter 'e' is any quicker when typing.  In fact, on a standard keyboard, the letter 'e' is actually closer to the "ready" position, with the number 3 being about an inch (2.5 cm) further to reach.

I also fail to see how your uprights (or are they the letter 'l' ?) with a hyphen between is quicker than the typing a single letter H when you are spelling the word 'He'.

btw (I'm not totally illiterate in newspeak), I have seen many of the younger generation writing in their colouring books with crayons.  I'm not sure I like the way things are headed as I can barely even discern letters, let alone words, in their written gibberish.  winky smile

Cheers,
CanuckMiner

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

It's n0t abput being quicker, it's abput b3ing d1fferent 3eyes

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

(OP)
Agreed, I think there may actually be two separate dialects here, one for typing quickly in-game (mostly acronyms) and the other for longer-form communication with an emphasis on being hard to read and 'individual.'

As UcfSE demonstrates, l33tspeak can be formed from normal English through character substitution, although I've seen much worse than that.

I wonder if any etymologists are studying this stuff?

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

I think I posted this info on another forum, but still good.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leet

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

leetspeak:

Once used by the hacker community as sort of a sub-culture language, ANYONE using this type of speak in the present day in age is either:

A) A clueless net newbie who somehow thinks its still "cool" to speak this way.

B) A veteren net user who uses it to parody the type of people mentioned in example A.

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

In regards to:
teh and pwned

They are stricty mis-spells of the actual words which took root in l33t speak and are not derivations. The interesting one is the use of meh which is basically a shrug and can have many meanings depending upon the conversation.

See: http://www.urbandictionary.com

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

   How about "pr0n"?

   I don't recommend a Google search during work hours.  :)

                            JHG

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

Where I work we have a 'tradition' of adopting mis-spelt or mispronounced words and typos when they produce something which (to our childish minds) is amusing. Therefore:

Lamps that you screw into lampholders are known as 'blubs'.

Angled bits of steel for supporting things are 'brockets'.

Electrical plugs and sockets are 'coonectors' (this one came from a government document).

Blow-by exhaust from a Diesel engine is 'blobby gas'.

Do other engineering offices do such silly things, or do we have too much time on our hands? (I don't think so)

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

how about gibberish ?

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

harrisj'

all I can say is "a crub, 2 burshes, and a fents".

I read this on thecarlounge.net a year or so ago (car wreck thread) and have had to stop myself from using "crub" and "fents" both in written and verbal communication ever since.

There is evidence that I am not the only Car Lounger with this issue.

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

I've had my fingers burnt by this before now... A friend and I use wrong terminology like crub, fents etc (can't think of any of our examples off the top of my head) quite often when chatting amongst ourselves. Unfortunately, his wife picks up on our terminology, thinks its the correct phrase and uses it out in the real world (most notably in shops trying to buy spare parts) and then comes back and gives both of us an a$$-whupping for letting her make a fool of herself!

RE: l33t speak translation - the voice of the younger generation

BTDT.

My family is fairly straight laced, language wise.

After uni I lived in a shared house where we were somewhat ribald (think The Young Ones) and invariably referred to the English TV soap opera "Coronation St" as "Fornication St". My (Spanish) girlfriend picked up on this, not realising the joke, and, inevitably, sat down to watch "Fornication St" with my family...to our intense amusement.

Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources