Comments on: AskMe orthography

AskMe orthography

JimN2TAW — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:21:20 -0800

Copied from a comment on AskMe: "TEH PORNZ IS SEEKRIT." Why didn't the commenter say "The porn is secret." Is this thought to be a funny way to write? (OK, make fun of me now.)

By: MadamM

MadamM — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:24:10 -0800

It's like Lolcats. So yeah, thought to be funny.

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:24:49 -0800

WHYZ U WRITZ SO GUDZ?

By: dawson

dawson — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:26:33 -0800

I think this is 'the internet from the 80's' type humor. One can find it in abundance on, say, the fark tube. Some people still find Bob Hope hilarious and jam to Jim Nabours.

By: yhbc

yhbc — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:29:37 -0800

You are doing it wrong.

By: fire&wings

fire&wings — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:29:51 -0800

I'M IN UR METATOK, SHOWING MAISELF TO B CHRONICLY OUT OF TOUCH WITH INTERNET TRENDZ.

By: dawson

dawson — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:31:12 -0800

Nabors, even. May God and the prophet be with him.

By: dawson

dawson — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:34:20 -0800

one more and I'll stop. Damn, Carol really was as hot as I used to think as a boy. Oh my. Let me be there in your night. Wink, wink.

By: smackfu

smackfu — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:39:31 -0800

People are also abbreviating "before" as b4 and "too" as 2. It's crazy!

By: smackfu

smackfu — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:40:42 -0800

And has MetaTalk become just the chat board now? Seems like people post whatever is crossing their minds.

By: CKmtl

CKmtl — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:44:50 -0800

Yes, it's supposed to be funny. A second layer of humour lies in the capitalized faux-shouting, given that teh pr0nz are supposed to be secret.

By: Justinian

Justinian — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:47:26 -0800

JimN2TAW: Also, the chicken wanted to get to the other side.

By: BrotherCaine

BrotherCaine — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:49:50 -0800

I almost made a post on MeTa the other day about the trend of mocking Republican supporters by deliberately misspelling words. 'Murrika for America, Librul, etc... Whenever I read right wing political blogs I see it all the time too. I'm not all that prescriptivist, but misspelling for humor makes the search function somewhat useless. I guess the only time I'm really concerned about it is when a best answer to an AskMe is in lolcat.

By: Miko

Miko — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:52:50 -0800

ALL YOUR ORTHOGRAPHY ARE BELONG TO US

By: gingerbeer

gingerbeer — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:55:54 -0800

Metafilter: when a best answer to an AskMe is in lolcat

By: Zambrano

Zambrano — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:57:41 -0800

I love how everyone pretends that lolcats stuff isn't racist.

By: Brandon Blatcher

Brandon Blatcher — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:58:08 -0800

And has MetaTalk become just the chat board now?

It's a dessert topping AND a floor wax.

By: sanko

sanko — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:59:26 -0800

Did you mean: "TEH PRONZ IS SEEKRIT" ?

By: rtha

rtha — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:02:34 -0800

I'm sorry. I can't resist.

I love how everyone pretends that lolcats stuff isn't racist.

What?

By: burnmp3s

burnmp3s — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:03:46 -0800

Why didn't the commenter say "The porn is secret." Is this thought to be a funny way to write?

Yes, this is indeed a funny way to write. The joke text contains three types of intentional defects, used for comedic effect: typo, all caps, and phonetic misspelling.

The use of typos and leetspeak for comedic effect was mostly popularized by SomethingAwful's Jeff K, a fictional "hax0r" that was a parody of the teenage hacker wannabes of the time. Jeff K's constant repeat of the common teh typo eventually made its way into Internet culture as a way to parody generic hacker language.

All caps and misspellings are more indicative of the later parody language of 4chan, specifically in LOLCATS. LOLCATS are humorous cat images, accompanied by text. The text is usually written in a fictional voice of the cat, which tends to be a broken form of English (due to the reduced intelligence of cats as a species when compared to humans).

By: roll truck roll

roll truck roll — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:04:30 -0800

lolcats isn't racist.

I fucking hate cats.

By: flashboy

flashboy — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:05:19 -0800

I'm sorry. I can't resist.

I love how everyone pretends that lolcats stuff isn't racist.

What?

I think you'll find that on our modern internet, that's actually written as:

what

By: rtha

rtha — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:11:34 -0800

yeah, I deliberated over "what" vs "What?", but decided that, tonally, "What?" conveyed what I was hearing in my head better than "what" did. It's funny what teh convenchunz of teh internets mayk us think about.

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:14:51 -0800

I love how everyone pretends that lolcats stuff isn't racist.

dog privilege is everywhere

By: desjardins

desjardins — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:16:28 -0800

I fucking hate cats.

Are you saying that because my cats are black?

By: infinitewindow

infinitewindow — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:16:52 -0800

LOL WUT

can be accurately represented as

[lal uat^h]

By: M.C. Lo-Carb!

M.C. Lo-Carb! — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:17:06 -0800

JimN2TAW, if you have any teenage kids, whatever you do, do not let them see this question.

By: desjardins

desjardins — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:19:03 -0800

ceiling cat sees your seekrit p0rn

By: dawson

dawson — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:20:38 -0800

I thought JimN2 was being sarcastic and ironic, no? hench my non sequitor replies

By: turaho

turaho — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:23:50 -0800

I remember a day back in 2001 when a bunch of camgirls (do they still have those?) registered accounts on MeFi (before it cost $5 to join) and were all "omfg" and "kthnxbai" and the denizens of Metafilter gathered up their pitchforks and ran them out of town, lest they destroy our way of life with their inane chatter and cutesy web abbreviations. Good times.

By: cortex

cortex — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:24:03 -0800

Racisming about lolcats is like dancing about architecture.

By: cortex

cortex — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:27:18 -0800

back in 2001 when a bunch of camgirls

Here.

By: desjardins

desjardins — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:28:02 -0800

Indoor cats talk like this, outdoor cats talk like that

By: turaho

turaho — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:28:39 -0800

Oh, I was thinking this one.

By: roll truck roll

roll truck roll — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:31:07 -0800

MetaFilter used to be so weird.

By: klangklangston

klangklangston — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:34:38 -0800

"I love how everyone pretends that lolcats stuff isn't racist."

LOLCATS DOESN'T CARE ABOUT BLACK PEOPLE

By: fixedgear

fixedgear — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:38:54 -0800

languagehat wrote a whole blog post thing about

what

just sayin'

By: Blazecock Pileon

Blazecock Pileon — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:40:25 -0800

Racisming about lolcats is like dancing about architecture.

Frank Zappa said it first.

By: dawson

dawson — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:54:59 -0800

Frank Zappa said it first.
But I thought it was Václav Havel?

By: Brocktoon

Brocktoon — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:58:13 -0800

By: roger ackroyd

roger ackroyd — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:59:31 -0800

LOLCATS aren't racist. Regular cats are elitist.

By: flashboy

flashboy — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:06:01 -0800

languagehat's post about

what

was great. I done a comment on it about Bill Murray, although thinking about it more, I'd probably refine my statement to say that

what

is the textual representation of the expression on Bill Murray's face.

By: loquacious

loquacious — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:11:26 -0800

I have no idea what any of you are talking about. So I'm just going to put these pants in my fish. I mean these pants on this fish. Err, I mean this fish on some pants. Fish pants. Pants fishing?

UK customers order now for up to an extra 50% of lame humour!

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:12:53 -0800

I like how language is alive.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:14:15 -0800

u av d ryt 2 feel safe ll d tym, includN wen UzN ICT or yr mob ph.

By: cortex

cortex — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:20:28 -0800

But I thought it was Václav Havel?

No, we had it de-claved.

By: Kwine

Kwine — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:25:55 -0800

It's supposed to be funny. Usually, it's "funny"

By: klangklangston

klangklangston — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:29:56 -0800

When I get off my ass, I'll finally get around to doing a mashup of the LOLCATS and the Oll Kerrect "immigrant"/Yellow Kid speak.

WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON PWND!

By: panboi

panboi — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:43:29 -0800

Ceiling Cat is..... BLACK!! SO LET'S STRING HIM UP BOYS!!!!

By: PeterMcDermott

PeterMcDermott — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:50:41 -0800

the denizens of Metafilter gathered up their pitchforks and ran them out of town

So was this the brief golden age before Metafilter became a boyzone?

By: Pronoiac

Pronoiac — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:51:18 -0800

Where's the languagehat post on "what."?

I tried to not write that as LOLCAT but it still looks concussed to me.

By: Smart Dalek

Smart Dalek — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:53:35 -0800

YOU'VE GOT A HAM RADIO CALLSIGN
MASHED INTO YOUR NAME,

AND YET

YOU'VE QUESTIONING US
ABOUT THE ARRANGEMENT
OF ALPHANUMERIC CHARACTERS?

THAT REALLY TAKES SOME CHEEK.

By: loquacious

loquacious — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:55:13 -0800

THAT REALLY TAKES SOME GEEK.

Fixed that for you.

By: Blazecock Pileon

Blazecock Pileon — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:57:50 -0800

Why didn't the commenter say "The porn is secret." Is this thought to be a funny way to write?

In the year 3535, archeologists will dig up hard drive remains and behold the wondrous Rosetta Stone that was once known as Ask Metafilter.

By: longsleeves

longsleeves — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 17:25:03 -0800

I was once as you, JimN2. I too asked to be schooled, and people were mostly very helpful.

By: lukemeister

lukemeister — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 17:31:46 -0800

^5 2 ALL N 2 ALL A G@@D NITE!

By: fixedgear

fixedgear — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 17:52:18 -0800

what

By: grouse

grouse — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 17:56:57 -0800

By: Cool Papa Bell

Cool Papa Bell — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 18:07:36 -0800

I think this is 'the internet from the 80's' type humor.

oh hai. is stop, hammer tyme?

By: bonaldi

bonaldi — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 18:41:46 -0800

so ANYWAY I am able to obtain a cheesburger? It may be compensation for the removal of my water receptacle. I had a water receptacle. And for the time when I was in the attic and accidentally happened upon you in your "private time". Despite which I nonetheless later assisted you with the technical difficulties you were having with the PC and helped increase the amount of memory it had.

You owe me.

By: moonmilk

moonmilk — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 18:44:58 -0800

the internet from the 80's

also:

[lal uat^h]

what

... LOL doesn't rhyme with roll? I've been doing it wrong!

By: potsmokinghippieoverlord

potsmokinghippieoverlord — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 19:13:22 -0800

People, people, people.

TEH PORNZ IS SEEKRIT - no

TEH PR0NZ IS IN TEH WOODZ -yes!

By: nola

nola — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 19:13:36 -0800

I only have one life to live let me live as a blonde

By: yhbc

yhbc — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 19:57:50 -0800

Okay, Zambrano is wfc123. i wondered where he'd gotten to.

By: dawson

dawson — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 19:58:50 -0800

this post is not a free pass to just post whatever the fuck flits thru yr demented minds...on topic people!!1one

By: miss lynnster

miss lynnster — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:04:09 -0800

Nabors, even. May God and the prophet be with him.

Actually you were right both times -- in England he's Jim Nabours.

By: arto

arto — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:19:07 -0800

I think you'll find it's spelled Gym Neighbours.

By: JimN2TAW

JimN2TAW — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:30:59 -0800

M.C. Lo-Carb: My son is 13 and now I'm ready for whatever. Thanks for the enlightenment.

By: JimN2TAW

JimN2TAW — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:39:46 -0800

Longsleeves: Your empathy is appreciated.

thanks again to all.

By: Pax

Pax — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:40:03 -0800

Someone set up us Jim Nabors.

By: kittens for breakfast

kittens for breakfast — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:44:14 -0800

Is this thought to be a funny way to write?

TEH INTERNETS

let me show you them

By: pupdog

pupdog — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 21:08:01 -0800

dog privilege is everywhere

Only the ignorant believe this! My brothers around the world are still wearing the leashes of their masters - We didn't land on the Squeaky Plymouth Rock, the Squeaky Plymouth Rock landed on us!

By: TomMelee

TomMelee — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 21:30:06 -0800

Haha that was me. Why not just ask me?

Yes, I will ameliorate the obfuscation now:
TEH PORNZ IS SEEKRIT

Is:
-in caps because it's sarcasm about being secret and it's excited (dude hide your porn!)
- (TEH) (PORNZ(meant to type P0RNZ))is in leetspeek because it's about secret hackery (file hiding!)
-(SEEKRIT) actually does NOT refer to LolCats but rather to this video, which I believe actually predates the LOLcats meme.
-PORN(Z) IS, improper plural, indicating a general noobness/lolcats style speech abnormality.

So yes, I wrapped it all into one big sexy bunch of nonsense.

For the record, I played Shadowbane until...well, not very long ago. Inside that MMORPG, we developed a crazy, weird, unique-unto-itself set of l33t done entirely to obfuscate text from the asian zerg and to generally be annoying (because what else can you do when its 12 vs 200?). Often I find that overflowing into my fake internet jargon.

Interestingly, you knew just what it meant. :)

By: blue_beetle

blue_beetle — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 22:06:46 -0800

Do we really need to HAF DIZ DESKRIPTIFIST VS. PRESKRIPTIFIST debate again?

By: katillathehun

katillathehun — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 22:21:31 -0800

Ceiling Cat is..... BLACK!! SO LET'S STRING HIM UP BOYS!!!!

FAIL!!!!!!! CEELIN CAT IZ WITE. IZ BASEMENT CAT DAT BLACK.

By: katillathehun

katillathehun — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 22:23:43 -0800

ALSO: LINCHEENG HUMOR. NOT SO GRET ACKSHULLY.

By: =^^=

=^^= — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 23:56:17 -0800

FWIW (for what it's worth) ceiling cat is a ginger

By: aramaic

aramaic — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 00:21:36 -0800

ceiling cat is a ginger

NO YUO!

By: casarkos

casarkos — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 00:30:29 -0800

i c wat u did thar

By: Astro Zombie

Astro Zombie — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 04:59:34 -0800

LANGWITCH IZ A VIREEZ FRUM OWTER SPEZZ.

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 06:02:45 -0800

"if you can't take ~~reality based tv~~ AskMe then you can't take ~~reality~~ MeTa which means you have a problem living in ~~reality~~ MeFi which means you have problems."

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 06:13:38 -0800

Oh, and, DiD aNyBodY HaVe a PrEeTeEn KiD wHo ToTaLlY Got iNtO XaNgA????

By: infinitewindow

infinitewindow — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 10:13:56 -0800

LOL rhymes with ball the way I talk. In any case, those are all the IPA glyphs I remember, and I'm fairly sure the [u] is wrong.

By: grobstein

grobstein — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 10:25:47 -0800

they speeks inglish in what

By: paisley henosis

paisley henosis — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 11:23:35 -0800

RACISM? IN MY LOLCATS?!?!

By: availablelight

availablelight — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 12:35:54 -0800

This is not relevant to my interests.

By: Sys Rq

Sys Rq — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 12:58:34 -0800

I like how language is alive.

How coem yu knoe teh langwidgez didnt b ded? Ai sawed nuffin inseid mai box, srsly.

By: TheOnlyCoolTim

TheOnlyCoolTim — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 13:15:55 -0800

In the year 3535, archeologists will dig up hard drive remains and behold the wondrous Rosetta Stone that was once known as Ask Metafilter.

Sometime after, alien archeologists visiting the eerily & mysteriously empty post-Singularity Earth uncover, among a great many other things, the fossil remains of a mudkip. They liek.

By: y2karl

y2karl — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 14:20:21 -0800

I CAN HAS LANGUAGECAT ?

By: hattifattener

hattifattener — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 14:42:57 -0800

Bah, when I misspell SEKRIT, it's a Bucakroo Banzai reference.

By: flarbuse

flarbuse — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 19:31:07 -0800

TEH PORNZ IS SEEKRIT

There are explanations above as to where this came from. But I did not see anyone really explain the prevalence of it.

Typing comments in that form basically insulates the commenter from being criticized for making a joke that falls flat. It is the safest form of joke to make. No one can mock the person for the comment because the person has the excuse that they weren't really making that joke. Rather, they were making fun of people who might make that joke.

So you can't go wrong making jokes using that form, and people who don't want their jokes to be criticized will continue to use it.

By: flabdablet

flabdablet — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 20:05:32 -0800

ʇɐɥʍ

By: not_on_display

not_on_display — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 22:58:47 -0800

O HAI I JUST GOT HEER DID SOM1 SAY SEKRIT PR0N??!???//

By: The Light Fantastic

The Light Fantastic — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 01:44:40 -0800

"I love how everyone pretends that lolcats stuff isn't racist."

Mai napsak, let me tell u about it.

By: turgid dahlia

turgid dahlia — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 15:04:17 -0800

This reminds me of the day I upgraded from a manual typewriter to my first computer. I was using Word Perfect 5.1 for DOS and when I got to the end of the first line, I went to hit the carriage return and knocked the monitor onto the floor.

By: radioamy

radioamy — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 17:25:26 -0800

By: CitizenD

CitizenD — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:38:42 -0800

(because what else can you do when its 12 vs 200?)

UR SPARTAZ REFRINS, LET ME MAK IT!

what

By: dg

dg — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:42:18 -0800

By: pupdog

pupdog — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 04:18:47 -0800

c'mon dg, WP5.1 wasn't even released until '89...

By: octobersurprise

octobersurprise — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 06:13:51 -0800

a mashup of the LOLCATS and the Oll Kerrect "immigrant"/Yellow Kid speak.

"OH HAI! Dese days teh funny is dead easy. All yer have ter do is have sum kats talkin and yez kin make a blog!"

By: quin

quin — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 07:52:03 -0800

infinitewindow : LOL rhymes with ball the way I talk.

When I use it verbally, I prefer to affect the most solemn tone I can muster, and slowly enunciate each letter.

"Wow, that is hilarious! [serious voice] Ell... Oh... Ell..."

Something about this makes people really uncomfortable.

By: Mayor West

Mayor West — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 08:10:05 -0800

Oh, man, the camgirl threads. Home of the best snark MeFi's ever produced:

kthxbi <333

I cannot possibly evaluate the truth of this statement without knowing the values of the variables k, t, h, x, b, and i.

The overwrought gravitas, ("think carefully"), the uncharacteristically sincere response from #1, the equally vapid accusations of elitism being hurled from both sides of the room, the horrible crashing derail into libertarian capitalism...

Like a cool zephyr across the smoldering landscape.

By: Ceiling Cat

Ceiling Cat — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 10:05:47 -0800

wot

afk brb

By: turgid dahlia

turgid dahlia — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 17:18:27 -0800

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 18:40:10 -0800

I less-than-three this place.

By: turgid dahlia

turgid dahlia — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 20:22:14 -0800

Well, it was in 1983, anyway.

Lighten up, Nancy.

By: dg

dg — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:13:24 -0800

<3 U 2 ;-)

By: turgid dahlia

turgid dahlia — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 20:08:49 -0800