Leet
According to the Wikipedia:
- Leet (often also Leetspeak, L337, b00bl3r, or 1337) From the phonetic form of the word "elite", is a cipher, or novel form of English spelling. It is characterized by the use of non-alphabet characters to stand for letters bearing a superficial resemblance, and by a number of spelling changes such as the substitution of "z" for final "s" and "x" for "(c)ks". Leetspeak is traditionally used on the Internet and other online communities, such as bulletin board systems. Leetspeak is used by hackers, script kiddies, gamers and (mainly) lamers.
Leet is used around the Academy, often in poor attempts at mocking those that actually use it. Leet may be vocalized in the phrases "pwned" (pronounced p-owned) or x > j00 (x is greater than joo), which typically means that the speaker believes x to be really cool, or, using the figure of speech ironically, rather dumb. On Second East, pwned has evolved into the phrase "pawned you, newb". Other common verbal usages include the "x0r" ending, which no longer is restricted to "h4x0r" or "suxx0rs" (leet for hacker and sucks, respectively), and can be appended to most verbs, as well as some nouns.
Interestingly enough, the graduation speaker for the Explorer class in 2004 was Dr. Richard Leet, a Northwest Alumnus. That was, unfortunately, the only interesting thing about him.
