Leet speak

[lolcat]

ceiling cats are funny...but i just dont get the whole "leet" speak.... i am too old i guess.

Translation: L337 speak started back in the days of hacking and evolved into the current gamer shorthand used primarily by players in FPS and RTS online games; when facing an opponent it's easier to use this form of shorthand for commands and to talk smack to your opponents. After playing video games heavily for the past few years the vernacular and phrasing comes easily. In a way, it is the language of the upcoming generation since a predominant amount of time is spent in these activities. It's been around quite a lot longer than any 'fad', and will continue to thrive due to games where key bindings are used and Ventrilo isn't accessible in PUG environments.

Lolcat has been a facet of this speech derivitive that I've found humorous since 4Chan, and due to the circles I've run with it's an accepted norm of speech in online forums and in game. Not abusive as some FPS gamers can get, (whew, not by far!), but innocent in a manner and perpetually happy. That is the joy of lolcat! As well it helps to hide gender and the nerdish stereotype that comes with being able to type coherent sentence structure with proper grammar in a fast-paced FPS/RTS environment; as soon as you type a sentence with proper punctuation, players either hit on you or call you a nerd. >.<

BUT U CAN LERN 2 SPEEK LOLCAT! LOLCAT WILL HALP! <(o_O)>

lol caps.

p.s. my cat talks like this. true story.

no, it's not just you, "leet" speak was a fad before just about EVERYONE realized how completely idiotic it is...
Be nice, even if people are different. Intolerance isn't a virtue. :saint:

Past fads that were actually cooler and more enjoyable that leet speak:
70's Disco

DISCO NEVER DIEDED!

Maybe his entry will have a little caption on it :þ

Squig

gud idea! i steal it & call it mah own!

What the flip is Ceiling Cat?

Ceiling Cat is God, or in the case of these forums, it's Frustrated Father since he's the Owner/Operator and the closest equivilant. It's like the slang term 'Boss' is a form of respect to those that are older/wiser than you. Just giving him props.

LONG LIVE TEH CEILIN CAT!

[EricJ]

I moved this over here, because I think it's something to discuss, but I don't want to hijack the Iron Painter sign up thread to do it!

Feel free to express your feelings on this here, i'll post in a bit.

[lolcat]

I moved this over here, because I think it's something to discuss, but I don't want to hijack the Iron Painter sign up thread to do it!

Feel free to express your feelings on this here, i'll post in a bit.

kk thx! thats a good idea. =)

[supervike]

Well, no disrespect intended, but the 'leet' speak IMHO, is rude, annoying, and frustrating.


It would be the same as if you went into a public place, and spoke to everyone in a funny voice, in a language that only a few could understand.

Maybe cute for a few seconds, but would tend to get rather old very quickly.

Now, if we were limited on the amount of characters we could use per post, maybe it would make sense....and hell, I'm getting to be old as dirt, so maybe I'm just not hip enough to 'get it'.

I also tend to judge people's intelligence by what they say, and in forum speak, what they type....not fair of me to do so, but it's the truth.

We'll those are my thoughts. That and 2.95 cents will buy you a cuppa joe.

[lolcat]

Explain how it is rude. Socially incorrect for these forums or uncultured/ill-bred?

And if it's not against the rules, then why is there such a ruckus? The verbal attacks I have received by members and Moderators made me sad when I logged on. =( (I wasn't going to cry, but it did hurt to see this.)

Whatever happened to tolerance and getting to understand that which is different from you? Would you react the same way to someone where English is their second language? Or a young person who doesn't have the schooling, or has a learning disability, and this is the best they could do? (There are young players who won't type anything else. A quick look at gaming forums will prove this to be true unfortunately.)

What started out being something that was fun, happy, and an exercise in creative writing has startled me in the responses I've received from this Wyrd community. It makes me wonder how anything I would create would be received, especially since I have no idea what Wyrd 'normal' is. Or because I'm learning how to paint and it won't be up to the 'standards'. =( Everyone tries to conform with any new group they are in; I bounced around and looked around. I left very positive comments for people. Yet first impressions are lasting impressions, and intolerance scares me away.

Think of the time and energy spent on my prose in a 24 hour period by the members and Moderators here. If this isn't a place for gamers like me, or you don't like the way I play, say so. No scratch that, most already did. I know there are other avenues out there. I just wanted to try my hand in the competition. =(

kkthxbai. This was very enlightening.

[Ritual]

There's no rule against it as it has never been needed! (There are other gaming and painting forums that HAVE rules against it, though...)

You may be used to environments where this type of typing is accepted or even deemed cool. But, here as in many other places it is a source of annoyance! I don't think people are trying to be rude to you, only point out that we would prefer if you wrote properly. It is far easier to conversate about what this site is truly about, miniatures, if we can understand each other without unnecessary annoyances. As I pointed out earlier, this is not a matter of demanding perfect English (my first language is not English, for instance), but trying to communicate as well as possible with each other. If you insist on using leet you will not make yourself understood properly and most people won't bother reading what you type. This is not that sort of place, simply!

If you're concerned about how your work is received I think you can rest easy. People here are mature enough to judge your work for what it is without holding your affection to leet against you. As one of the judges in the Iron Painter competition I can guarantee you that it won't have any implications in that area. But, people will tire of reading your posts if you insist on using leet. That is inevitable, and has nothing to do with intolerance.

Personally, I fail to see the creativeness in writing "silly". I tend to focus on WHAT people write (or say) and not HOW they write it (especially if HOW they write it makes it more difficult for me to know what they mean).

Now, this post is not a way to try and put you down or anything. Just an attempt at trying to reach some sort of understanding here.

[Duende]

That and 2.95 cents will buy you a cuppa joe.

Shouldn't that be "cup of coffee". How dare you use slang terminology around here mister!

:secruity:

I can't believe I've just seen prejudice in action for the first time here at Wyrd.

Sure, I'm no big fan of leet speak, but since I was already familiar with the ICanHasCheezburger site, and his name was lolcat, I guess I was more tolerant with hearing it from him than anybody else. But also, he has written "normally" in some of his posts already, showing that he IS capable of showing intelligence when he wants to, his use of leet speak was just to be whimsical.

So now we've just driven away a new member/painter/gamer because everybody came down on him because he was a bit... weird. Nice.



:irked: :disappoin



*edit* Sorry, Anders, your post wasn't there earlier when I was writing mine. But it sure seems like everyone else was "Oh MY God! Look, a leetspeaker! Burn Him!!" I got a PM from him thanking me for making him feel welcome, and I really appreciated it. I wish he would be welcome, it's not like he's BME or anything. He's just different, and I know how it is to feel different and unwelcome.

[Ritual]

I can't see how this is about prejudice! This guy apparently can write properly, but despite being told from the start that writing leet speak would annoy people he insisted on doing it and expected everyone else to accept it. I think I made some good points about why it causes annoyance above.

[demonherald]

I have to say that I didn't have a clue what this Leet speak thing was about but I agree with the points above about it not been a good form of coversing in this kind of forum...Call me old grumpy miserable or whatever but The barrier it causes for me in understanding and figuring out just isn't worth the effort..it's a shame as mentioned as with all forums and discussion boards the more the merrier but multiple posts of random (to me ) jibberish bring threads dow.. sure have a leet speak thread and use it to your hearts content but when asking about taking part in an event or introducing yourself at least bear in mind that some people just won't get it so be prepared to be picked up on it...

whimsical is nice overuse is intrusive....I think the very fact that it has caused a bit of a ruckus on boards where I haven't ever witnessed that says a lot about it....I suppose it's like all social quirks or habits I have nothing against you using them but also be respectful of how others around you feel about it.... The same reason I don't swear or smoke near my Grandma.......

anyway thats my tuppence worth.....

[Wren]

p.s. my cat talks like this. true story.


I've been wondering if that's your cat in your avatar? He's very cute.

My opinion... lolcat is one of the few internet memes I'm actually up on, so I got what was going on. I wouldn't have any objection to it as a small part of a post or the occasional short reaction post or that sort of thing, I can see how you're using it to have fun and establish a bit of personality and such. For the majority of posts and particularly longer ones with important content I'd prefer standard English. I have trouble with basic acronyms, sounding out lol/leet speak can be headache inducing for me. ;->

There's a guy who posts on another forum I frequent who has a very distinct posting style - caps in weird places, lots of italic and bold formatting, different coloured words, random punction marks and weird phrasing. He started on the forum in the early days, and people divided into two camps, those who seem to treat him as some sort of mascot and defend his right to be odd, and those who find his posts to be gibberish and ignore him. Attempts to reform his behaviour are singularly unsuccessful. I think this has happened because he was a sort of founding (or soon after) member. If he joined up now I think he'd be harried off the forum or shunned. People get used to a certain atmosphere in a particular place, and expect newcomers to adopt behaviour that conforms to that. (Even if the atmosphere isn't spelled out, which admittedly can make it challenging on the newcomers sometimes.)

Or to put it another much more succinct way... from what you've said, if I wandered over to an FPS community and communicated the way I am here, which is how I communicate most of the time, people might insult me or come on to me because I don't fit in with the way the main group behaves. That sounds at least as rude or more so to me as the reaction here of people stating they'd prefer standard English, but I'd be failing to conform to the norms of the group, so it wouldn't be surprising.

All that said, I understand why you'd be feeling a little picked on, and I hope you'll think about a middle ground method of communication and give the forum another chance. If you'd like to see how people react to all different levels of painting go into the Gallery section and look at the comments posted under minis in the Iron Painter or any of the contest sections. I've seen the occasional sharp comment, but 99% of them or more are constructive feedback and an acknowledgement that there are many different levels of painter.

[Ritual]

...it's not like he's BME or anything. He's just different, and I know how it is to feel different and unwelcome.

Thank god he's not BME! :D

Well, he is welcome here and would be even more welcomed if he would take people's advice and write properly as leet speak simply is not appreciated here (so, what's the point of doing it?). And, he's proven himself that he's not so different that he can't write properly. So, it's more a question of wanting to...

[thetang22]

My problem with it is that it has developed into something totally different than what it was invented for. Much like you say - it was a form of shorthand for gamers who needed to type stuff quickly during the course of a fast paced game, therefore they developed 'shortcuts' so that it wouldn't interrupt the flow of their gaming. I can understand the legitimate use in such an instance.

However, when it started trying to break through into popular culture it really started losing its meaning. Lots of "l337" words were not even shortened forms of the word they were supposed to mean, they were just blatant misspellings of the original word. In some of cases the l337 word didn't even resemble what it was supposed to mean. And where it really gets idiotic is that some l337 words were even LONGER than the word that they were supposed to be a form of shorthand for (I can't come up with an example off the top of my head, but I know I've seen it before because thats one of my problems with it). Now what the heck is the point of that??? When you are creating a form of shorthand and a good portion of the words aren't even shorter than the originals, then why??? Thats when it starts breaking through into the idea that people do it just because they think it makes them look cool and "elite."

When it really started getting a bad reputation was when people who liked speaking l337 would trash talk people in l337 just because their target didn't speak it. After all, thats what it was pretty much invented for in the first place, but it wasn't intended to be aimed at anybody and everybody, strictly at people you were gaming with.

But anyway, back to my point - The whole idea of l337 speak was to help continue the flow of the games that were being played. Lets translate that to any random public forum today - instead of games we want to maintain a nice flow of conversation - that is the goal of a forum. However, l337 speak does exactly the opposite, as many people have said.

When you are reading through a nice set of posts on an interesting topic, the average person is going to come to a huge road block when they come to a post in l337 speak. All of a sudden they have to read the post very slowly and try and figure out what the heck the person is trying to communicate. Like many others have said, they don't mind it as long as its used where it is welcome - a forum where lots of users speak it, but the average forum has a VERY small percentage of people who enjoy it.

Plain and simple - l337 speak interrupts the flow of dialogue. It has pretty much lost every sense of shortcut it ever had, except within the original context that it was created for (multiplayer gaming), and it should have stayed there.

[Ritual]

Very nicely and sensibly put!

[Coneman]

Very well said thetang22.

[Illustrange]

Whatever happened to tolerance and getting to understand that which is different from you? Would you react the same way to someone where English is their second language? Or a young person who doesn't have the schooling, or has a learning disability, and this is the best they could do? (There are young players who won't type anything else. A quick look at gaming forums will prove this to be true unfortunately.) .

Actually, (and I dont mean this rude, as far as tolerant persons go, I can convincingly claim to be very tolerant as in one of my schools I was the only "friend" of an extreme right wing / white power girl there.. and I was the only non-white person in the class O_O) thats allready a wrong view you have there, it is a current hot topic in dutch actualities too (altough my views on that topic contradict what Im going to say ;)), tolerance/respect/freespeech and understanding what is different is definitely not the same thing as everyone can do, act and talk as they please, you see if that was the case we shouldnt even be condemning criminals (not that I compare leet speak to a crime.) as they just have different views than ours, or if someone at school makes a punching bag out of you at school.. and a teacher says *well thats just the way he is, you gotta tolerate that.* that is not how a social comfortable envoriment is created, wich is the whole point of *tolerance* in the first place.
Tolerance is much more about things that CANT be helped... tolerating a woman as a boss, tolerating black people equal to white, tolerating people who have different sexual preferences, .. these things are matters of a persons nature, more closer to *speech* would be a dislectic person, but nobody would be annoyed by a dislectic person (or someone, like me, who's main language isnt english.) most of all because we know it cant be helped, and on the otherside because any dislectic person I know tries their best to make themselves understandable. leet talk is exactly the opposite, you try your best to be ununderstandable (as you are among people who dont speak leet talk.. I refuse to use the numbers btw :)) even tough we know that is not part of who you are.
to that same extend... would you use leet talk on schooltests.. on a job interview ? if you really believe that strongly in it.. you should, otherwise you would be a hypocrite, this would however cause you to fail tests, and not get any job, however that is the course someone has to take for his beliefs... and as such, with strong beliefs you just avoid places were people dont share it, that is however still NOT a matter of intolerance.

in fact (and I stress that I still sustain a welcoming/helping tone to my post as opposed to a critical one, trust me.) it is quite the opposite, as you can talk/type normal, and people have asked you to write normal, you are the one being intolerant.. you are intolerant of other people feelings in this instance, again, Im merely trying to explain than to judge.

one thing that was said too was that *many kids talk like that nowadays* .. yes, I know, but that actually increases the problem, because if that language use becomes more common among kids, and nobody does something about it, they will severely damage their language-skills (as I see with my little brother.) and it doesnt seem limited to language skills only. you see *creative talking* is all fun and all, but you are talking about changing a language overnight that took hundreds or thousands of years to shape.
this by instance makes the language little more than gibberish. worse thing of all, it is not even a subconscious change.

I also dont really see were most of the comments were personal attacks or even hatefull.
and running away is never a solution, as by that you stop a discussion, wich means you will never learn from the event, nor will the people you are talking to.

tell me, why do you want to speak leet, what does it add to your life, why is it so important ? in the end tolerance is only achieved trough open communication about differencies. by neglecting this part, you only reinforce the prejudice and prove it right, because you act exactly as was expected. (wich infact is exactly my toughts of the current situation in the netherlands I realise :))

[Illustrange]

ps: thethang22

an example would be p0wned .. wich is *short* for owned .. wich makes no sense als owned is not only a shorter word, but also consists of letters that are in the same vicinity as pwned .. but the latter has a 0 inside wich is on a higher location on the keyboard... in fact taking (tough minuscule.) more energy to type ;)

[supervike]

Explain how it is rude. Socially incorrect for these forums or uncultured/ill-bred?


I did explain how it is rude. It is rude the same way if someone would go into a bar and continually speak in a 'funny voice' that only a few could understand.


There are no rules against it at all. Feel free to use it, I was just giving my opinion...as I thought this thread was a discussion of LEET speak (maybe I'm wrong here)

AGAIN...just my opinion....NOT a hard and fast rule!


And if it's not against the rules, then why is there such a ruckus? The verbal attacks I have received by members and Moderators made me sad when I logged on. =( (I wasn't going to cry, but it did hurt to see this.)

A disagreement is far from a verbal attack. I'm sorry if you took my posts as such...I certainly didn't mean it in that regard.

Whatever happened to tolerance and getting to understand that which is different from you? Would you react the same way to someone where English is their second language? Or a young person who doesn't have the schooling, or has a learning disability, and this is the best they could do? (There are young players who won't type anything else. A quick look at gaming forums will prove this to be true unfortunately.)

I have a ton of tolerence, and I would absolutely NOT react the same way to someone with English as their second language, or a disabled person. Comparing the two is like comparing Apples and Blowfish.... You aren't telling me that 'leet' speak is the "best" you could do, are you?

LEET speak has it's place. In the gaming world, before real time voice was added, you only had a short time to communicate with other players (or else you were virtually destroyed). It makes sense in that context.


What started out being something that was fun, happy, and an exercise in creative writing has startled me in the responses I've received from this Wyrd community. It makes me wonder how anything I would create would be received, especially since I have no idea what Wyrd 'normal' is. Or because I'm learning how to paint and it won't be up to the 'standards'. =( Everyone tries to conform with any new group they are in; I bounced around and looked around. I left very positive comments for people. Yet first impressions are lasting impressions, and intolerance scares me away.

No no no, please don't go away!! Allow me to apologize if I came across as intolerant. I had no idea people took "LEET" so seriously.



Think of the time and energy spent on my prose in a 24 hour period by the members and Moderators here. If this isn't a place for gamers like me, or you don't like the way I play, say so. No scratch that, most already did. I know there are other avenues out there. I just wanted to try my hand in the competition. =(


Not every post is expected to be a poetic statement, but if it takes more time to decifer what someone is saying, it's much easier to just skip it, and disregard that person all together. Again, I'm not being rude or intolerant here, it's just a cold hard fact.

I don't want you to leave, and I certainly would love to see you compete in the IRON PAINTER, but I'm not going to beg it of you.


kkthxbai. This was very enlightening.


Oh, and for the record, I do the the ceiling kitty is funny.

[EricJ]

Well, I was going to post up my thoughts here, but most of them really seem to have been pretty throughly covered by everyone. In my opinion, there were no attacks directed against you, but only discontent about the way in which you chose to communicate. This forum is created and used for communication of ideas, with communication being the key word. When posts are illegible to most of the community, especially when it's obvious that person can post very clearly, it starts just looking no different than spam posts, in that we can't or don't want to read them. Ultimately you're doing yourself and the community a disservice and obviously it causes a lot of frustration.

Believe it or not, I've actually been around leet speak a lot through the years, between multiple online gaming situations, living in a place surrounded by the most densely packed population of programmers (Silicon Valley), and with several friends who are or have been game designers/testers/fanatics, I've gotten more than my share of it. The funny thing is that what I've found is that almost everyone actually in the industry can't stand it anymore, MUCH more than you'd find in this forum. Ventrillo and such has almost completely made it an obsolete tool, yet it persists in certain communities despite it all.

I actually have a friend who runs a whole office of game testers at EA, and when hiring new people, he actually won't do it if they use any leet speak in the interview at all, and once hired it's not allowed in the office. It's not the next language in computers, although I know how it can feel that way when you spend a lot of time in communities where it's an iconic part of that communities culture. But once you get a step past these pocket communities, you'd be surprised by the overall general annoyance the rest of the world has for it, particularly in the computer industry.

It's not against the rules here, and while we have had several reported posts about it, the moderators have decided not to delete or edit any of the posts. Similarly we won't delete or edit any of the posts by members expressing their dislike of it. They are both personal expressions, and allowable, although if anyone crosses the line and does make a personal attack, that's when we step in.

It's obvious we'd all like you to stay, and you'll find a TON of help here as you learn to paint and improve your painting skills, as the community as a whole is very kind and helpful. But this issue is obviously a serious point of annoyance to a large part of the community, and while it's your option to continue using it or not, I think you might find less and less people replying to your posts if you do unfortunately.

[thetang22]

I hope we didn't scare lolcat away...

Since we've started discussing all the annoying aspects of l337 speak I don't think he has been around much. Hopefully its just that part of the day when he's at work/school/generally busy and hasn't been able to log on. I read some of lolcat's posts using normal language and it seems as though he can construct well-written and understandable comments when he wants to. I just hope he didn't decide this community wasn't for him.

(I am going to stick to my guns, however, on my opinions of l337 speak :))

[supervike]

I was thinking more about it.

It really is the digital equivalent of pig latin. Cute for a little while, funny, whisical. But then try talking to someone using that for an extended period of time....

[Dragonforge]

I just ignore it..

He or she not sure if we have determined that yet.. could be giving me the ultimate meaning of life and I'm going to miss out for sure.. but I have to agree with most..cute yes in short bursts..long paragraphs its childish and annoying.

I'm glad its not an issue on other forums I'm on where in the forum rules state , NO l337 speak is allowed.. Nips it right in the bud.

[Valmont]

Leet, Piglatin, and in 40k Forums, Ork Speak, all wind up in the same place (for me) as for folk who won't capitalize or use the occasional page break.

Unreadable on a computer screen.

I don't think I could actually figure out which of those would be harder to read.

Hopefully now that Lolcat has posted to us in a non-leet, that could continue. If not, que sera sera. Different strokes for different folks. Heck, maybe there is a rabid minority of wyrders that prefer it.

[green stuff]

Explain how it is rude.
C'est simple : on pige rien à ton délire.

Des personnes comme Anders, Marijn, Stéphane, et Gaël se donnent du mal à écrire en anglais pour se faire comprendre; autant leur montrer du respect en retour.

Happy babelfishing ;).

[Illustrange]

C'est simple : on pige rien à ton délire.

Des personnes comme Anders, Marijn, Stéphane, et Gaël se donnent du mal à écrire en anglais pour se faire comprendre; autant leur montrer du respect en retour.

Happy babelfishing ;).

Hey hey now, so do I !! :p

if I understand correctly what you are saying ;) (without babelfish, I really want to be able to understand as many languages as my old man.)

[green stuff]

Sorry for not mentionning you too Melvin ;). (and sorry for the many others who don't speak English as a first language :P)

[DeafNala]

I've been folowing this thread with some interest as it touches on a little problem of my own;i.e, a problem with communications. As someone who has, in politically correct terms, "a profound hearing loss" [read deaf as a post], I have gotten rather used to having to work hard at understanding what folks had to say to me. I've found that there are quite a lot of people who get really annoyed at having to repeat themselves, & I must admit forming a harsh opinion of these individuals. There is a certain amount of exclusion involved in not being able to hear.

I view these on-line communiques as rather special, almost like being able to hear again, although without music [can't have everything you know]..Well then, I stumbled across one of lolcat's posts, followed closely by his/her introduction. After working on trying to understand what he/she was saying, & failing utterly, I got that old "outside of life looking in feeling," & I confess I got just as p.o.'d as those people I'm often critical of for their lack of patients with my own problem.

Lesson learned: I will endeavor not to harbor ill feelings for those who avoid communicating with me for the repeat factor. Having now shared a common feeling, I can understand better where they are coming from, &, since they are, after all, missing out on my sparkling wit & insight, I can show them some compassion, jerks though they are.

So I thank everyone involved in this lengthy discussion for helping me with a bit of self improvement. Now if we could work on a few more of my glaring faults, I could apply for sainthood.

[Avelorn]

4 n noengelish speakr it not ez 2 unterstan! luv teh catz tho

kthnxbai