1513375p34k in the Ubergeek Community
Kathy Schubel
Nov. 18, 2003
Almost all occupational folk groups develop their own sets of jargon or slang that are self-exclusive to their own community. Often, this new vocabulary extends to unconventional grammatical structures and even new spellings. One particularly complicated example of this phenomenon—often referred to as folk speech—is the intentionally confusing online language known as leetspeak. Leetspeak, which is almost never spelled out by its users, but rather written as 13375p34k or 1337 in numeric code, is a slang 'language' that is used and understood only by members of the online gaming/hacking community. Members of this folk group go by several slang nicknames, including 'ubergeeks' and 'cyberphreakz', but the most popular title and the one that will be used henceforth is simply 'leeters'.
As a folk group, the leet community is unique in that almost all communication takes place through the internet in a text-based environment. Therefore, unlike other folk groups, leet folklore does not have its roots in oral tradition, but rather in digital mediums such as in-game chat windows and online forums. Among the many millions of people who use the internet, the leeters form a tight and exclusive group. Advanced knowledge of game strategies, gaming etiquette, computer technicalities and coding serve to separate members of the leet community slightly from the masses, but the true group identity becomes most defined through the group's folk speech. Jan Harold Brunvand, a long-time expert on folklore, states that "The easiest test of a folk group's existence is to identify a specialized informal vocabulary […]" (Brunvand 79). As implied by this statement, leetspeak plays an extremely important role in shaping the leeters' group identity and making them unique from the rest of the online community.
The first and most basic word in leetspeak is 'leet'. It is generally agreed that 'leet' is derived from the second syllable of 'elite'. It is an adjective used to refer to members of the online gaming/hacking community who have exceptional gaming skills or coding knowledge and also know how to use and understand leetspeak. It is also used as a noun as the shortened form of 'leetspeak'. It is important to note that 'leet' is almost never typed as pronounced, but rather incorporated with numeric code and other keys that resemble the appropriate letters; 1337, l33t, and 133+ are the most common.
To provide first-hand information regarding leetspeak and its uses, three informants were interviewed. The first informant is Sai, who has had five years of experience playing the online games EverQuest and CounterStrike and regularly reads webcomics based on leet culture. Second is E.V., whose claims to leetness are that he plays many online games, uses leetspeak almost every day, and enjoys "harass[ing] people in leet because they don't know what I'm saying." The third informant, Ed Chung, has an online gaming record that dates back to 1993, quoting "probably nineteen million" as the number of hours he has played such games in total. He proudly explains that he "played Starcraft [an online game] in the AMD-PGL and played CounterStrike in the CAL," but does not feel that his other gaming experiences qualify as 'leet' because he did not reach prestigious levels in competition.
The first thing the informants were asked to do was name some words that first came to mind upon hearing the term 'leetspeak'. Chung responded, "leet, roxor, suxor, woot, y0, f46, j00, haxor, f34r, and leet skillz," pointedly spelling out the numeric code and emphasizing that the meaning is changed without it. The uses and meanings of numeric code in leetspeak are apparently of great importance, so the next portion of the interview involved my speaking some leetspeak phrases orally. The informants were asked to type the phrase to me as they would type it in a game or forum setting, and then explain what the phrase means. This exercise provided some insight into leetspeaks' complex coding system.
Several levels of coding are involved in leetspeak. First, unique vocabulary is introduced. For example, take the phrase "suxorz", which is a leet verb meaning 'to suck'. This alone may be confusing to outsiders, but the next level of coding involves character replacement. '0' for 'o', '3' for 'e', '4' for 'a', '5' for 's', '6' or '9' for 'g', and '7' for 't' are common numeric code substitutions, but other characters and combinations of characters are used as well, such as '|)' for 'd', '|\|' for 'n', '\v/' for 'w', '' for 'x', '|2' for 'r', and many, many others. To give an example, Sai, E.V. and Chung's typed versions of 'suxorz' are, respectively, "suX0rz", "5ux04z", and "5u0rz". The variations in these responses show that there is no official 'correct' spelling or substitution for any particular word or letter, but the substitutions are necessary. If a person is truly leet, he is expected to be relatively familiar with all workable substitutions and able to derive the meaning of what is being said from its context.
A third layer of coding comes into play when actual spellings of words are changed. According to , spellings are most frequently changed in two ways. First, the spelling is changed to match the phonetic pronunciation of the word. Common examples are 'd00d' for 'dude', 'phear' or 'ph34r' for fear', 'ne' for 'any', and 'j00' for 'you'. Second, spellings are changed when frequent typos become absorbed into the language. For example, 'yuo' for 'you', 'teh' for 'the', and 'pwn' for 'own'. (Wikipedia 3). When asked to type the phrase 'you suxorz' as they would online, Sai, E.V. and Chung replied "J00 suX0rz", 'u 5ux04z', and 'j00 su0rz', respectively. Another phrase the informants were asked to type out was "you're a camping lamer". 'Lamer' is slang for a lame or pathetic player, and has several evolved phonetic spellings including 'lamah' and 'llama'. Sai, E.V. and Chung wrote the original phrase in three very different ways: "ur a camping l4m3r", "u4 /-\ ca/\/\p1n6 1/-\m34", and "j00 4mp1nG ll4ma," respectively.
One question of interest during the interview was whether or not leeters absorb leetspeak into their oral vocabulary during ordinary conversation. "Yes, all the time. Suxorz, roxorz, leet d00d, and loll," says Sai, giggling slightly. In contrast, Chung matter-of-factly states, "No, the essence of leetness is in the text, and anytime I use it orally it's only a representation of the text." One word that makes an interesting study of this textual-verbal transition is 'newbie'. A newbie, as any leeter knows, is a person who is new or inexperienced at an activity, especially a game or computer language. In code, the word is usually typed in its phonetic abbreviated form as 'n00b'. I asked the three informants to speak the word, noting carefully the distinction between 'nyewb' as in 'cube' (the proper pronunciation of the original word 'newbie') and 'noob' as in 'tube' (the non-leet pronunciation for an 'oo' sound). None of the informants pronounce the whole original word 'newbie'. Sai and E.V. pronounce it "nyewb", a strange combination of the natural pronunciation of 'newbie' and the literal pronunciation of its abbreviation 'n00b'. Chung pronounces the word 'noob'. Immediately catching on to the distinction being made, he comments, "When you replace 'ew' with '00', it changes the pronunciation." He goes on to imply that 'newbie' and 'noob' might be developing independent meanings. "Noob" is more disrespectful than "newbie," he says.
As with all folklore, leetspeak serves a specific purpose for the leet community. Webcaster's Almanac, an online jargon website, notes that "LeetSpeak creates a group identity and makes communication unintelligible to those on the outside or "newbies" (n00bs)." (Webcaster's, 1). An almost identical theory can be found at under "Leet". I posed this cultural question to each of the informants, asking why people type in coded leetspeak. "Some of it is used for abbreviations so that you can type it faster and be less likely to get your group killed waiting for directions," says Sai, but in reference to the coding she adds, "For color, you know, to make it more interesting, to make it something only they [leeters] had, to be original with." In response to the same question, E.V. claims that the purpose of leetspeak is "To confuse outsiders, and a way to make fun of people who don't know what's going on without them knowing." He adds, "It's sometimes easier to type numbers and stuff during battle than words," supporting Sai's suggestion that leetspeak might have part of its origins in intended efficiency rather than obscurity. Knowing him to be the most experienced leeter among my informants, I turned the question over to Chung. He answered simply, "It's for segregating people who are 'in' from people who are 'out'."
Intentional or not, leetspeak certainly does accomplish this segregation. It is met with great confusion and sometimes disdain by those who are 'out' as Ed says and have no idea what is going on. For example, consider the website , whose puffy motto reads "the last bastions of intelligent discussion." One thread that was started in its forums is an angry rant titled "You ever get that not so fresh feeling?, Just too Geek for your own good….," which complained of the apparent stupidity of leetspeak and its users. The responses that followed the original post were a debate on the meaning, purpose, and acceptability of leetspeak as a language, and most of the comments spoke of it with extreme negativity. One such post, submitted by "Silencer Squadleader", complains, "My take on l33t speak is that the point of language is to make the person you are communicating with understand what you are trying to express as soon as possible. […] Not every English speaking person understand leet speek, therefore it is an inefficient of communicating." Of course, this complaint requires as its basis that leeters are actually trying to communicate with anyone but themselves. As Sai, E.V., Chung and several online sources suggest, the very heart and soul of leetspeak is the rule that not all are intended to understand it. It is written to be understood by a very specific audience, and to be deliberately nonsensical to all else who read it. 73h \v/|-|013 p01|\|7 0f 13375p34k 15 7h47 n00bs & 73h u|\|1337 4|\| |\|07 _$7 |\||) 17.
This exclusion, although infuriating to outsiders, is often considered 'lots of fun' by leeters (take for instance E.V.'s earlier comment about harassing people). On a deeper level, however, this folk speech may be a crucial key to maintain the leet community's originality and identity. It is something only the leet can use, and something that discerns them from the rest of the online community in a way that is well-adapted for an online setting—through text. The degree to which someone uses leet also shows what status he has in the leet community. Toward other leeters, it is proof of leetness; proof that he belongs in this group. Toward outsiders, it gives an indifferent warning, "You're not meant to understand, and unless you're one of us you never really will." In short, Leetspeak separates the leet from the unleet and gives the group a sense of individuality, identity and community.
With all this said, it is worthwhile to consider where leetspeak is headed from here. In one edition of The Straight Dope website's ask-and-respond column, Ask Cecil, a nervous older reader asks Cecil's opinion on what possible effects leetspeak could have on the English language itself. "Is this just bad English, or is this the next step? Will the English language in 100 years look like the rantings of a 15-year-old hacker as we see it now, and will numbers become letters […]?" Cecil begins to answer this by explaining what he, as a middle-aged non-leeter, knows about leetspeak, and then notes "At this point you may be thinking: This is |-|0r535|-|17. That's what you're supposed to think, ancient one. Leet is for kids. The whole point is to communicated only with the chosen few, and to frustrate everybody else. That's why there's little danger of leet taking over the English language, which by contrast is useful because it's so widely understood." (Straight Dope 2). Cecil makes a very good point here, and it indeed seems unlikely that English will ever evolve into numeric code and character substitutions. However, with the ever-increasing bandwidth available to gamers, the fast-growing popularity of online games, and the more-and-more-frequent incorporation of microphone technology into such games, it seems likely that some leet words will eventually migrate to the spoken language, and maybe even enter common use among the general population. Once that occurs, however, the leeters will most likely abandon those words and develop new ones, because once the words become commonplace they lose their distinctive secrecy and leetness. The leet phenomenon will continue to grow and change, as any folklore will, but its purpose will be the same: to provide the leet community with a sense of identity and uniqueness and to distinguish it from the masses as a distinct cultural group.
Works Cited
Brunvand, Jan Harold. "The Study of American Folklore; An Introduction, 4th ed." New
York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1968.
Chung, Ed. Personal and online interview. 16 Nov. 2003.
E.V. Telephone and online interview. 16 Nov. 2003.
Leet – Wikipedia. 27 Oct. 2003. ;.
Sai. Telephone and online interview. 16 Nov. 2003.
The Straight Dope – Ask Cecil – What the heck is "leetspeek?" 17 Nov. 2003.
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Webcaster's Almanac. 17 Nov. 2003.
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xForums – You ever get that not so fresh feeling. 27 Oct. 2003.
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