w00t!

December 13, 2007 7:11 AM

Newsfilter: w00t! w00t! w00t!
posted by ubiquity (84 comments total)

w00t!
posted by C17H19NO3 at 7:15 AM on December 13, 2007

It's a lame choice, but relative to "facebook" as a verb....

The word is also considered an acronym in the online gaming world for "We owned the other team,"...

The online gaming world needs to get off my lawn, as documented on Wikipedia. I was definitely hearing "w00t" in the mid-90s.
posted by DU at 7:16 AM on December 13, 2007

I have serious doubts about any of these post hoc etymologies, especially ones involving backronyms. Next thing you know, they're going to claim booyah or any number of other interjections are really acronyms.
posted by grouse at 7:21 AM on December 13, 2007

meh
posted by HuronBob at 7:24 AM on December 13, 2007

wtf
posted by adamvasco at 7:26 AM on December 13, 2007

Will this be the first time a word with numbers for letters will be in a dictionary?
posted by drezdn at 7:26 AM on December 13, 2007

Merriam-Webstwn3d
posted by Mach5 at 7:27 AM on December 13, 2007 [3 favorites]

Some other possible etymologies.
posted by Iridic at 7:29 AM on December 13, 2007

Surpised n00b isn't in there. :(
posted by C17H19NO3 at 7:29 AM on December 13, 2007

Boys Owning Other Yahoos At Home
posted by DU at 7:29 AM on December 13, 2007

Will this be the first time a word with numbers for letters will be in a dictionary?

No, the OED includes "0800".
posted by hoverboards don't work on water at 7:32 AM on December 13, 2007

(OK, that's not strictly numbers-for-letters...)
posted by hoverboards don't work on water at 7:33 AM on December 13, 2007

Why does everything have to stand for something? Sometimes words is just words.
posted by ORthey at 7:34 AM on December 13, 2007

Can't believe nobody's posted this...
posted by drhydro at 7:35 AM on December 13, 2007

I guess I never really thought about it, I always read "w00t" as the nerd-chic version of the way rappers yell "WHAT!" incessantly as an interjection for any number of reasons.

shows what I know I guess.
posted by Uther Bentrazor at 7:37 AM on December 13, 2007

Will this be the first time a word with numbers for letters will be in a dictionary?

From the article:

“The word "w00t," spelled using the number zero in place of the letter "o," placed first in a Top Ten list based on votes by visitors to Merriam-Webster's website.”

“Merriam-Webster said "w00t" hasn't made it into the dictionary but being chosen as word of the year "just might improve its chances."”

It’s not in the dictionary yet. It just won in some contest. Remember when Hank the Angry Drunken Dwarf won the Most Beautiful contest?
posted by bondcliff at 7:37 AM on December 13, 2007

Hurrah for w00t! How quaint.
Anyone ever notice that "gullible" isn't in the OED?
posted by not_on_display at 7:41 AM on December 13, 2007

Anyone ever notice that "gullible" isn't in the OED?
What's actually interesting is that this joke has been repeated so many times that the joke itself is now in the OED entry for gullible (which does, of course, exist).
posted by Wolfdog at 7:49 AM on December 13, 2007 [5 favorites]

What's actually interesting is that this joke has been repeated so many times that the joke itself is now in the OED entry for gullible (which does, of course, exist).

Fool me once...
posted by bondcliff at 7:50 AM on December 13, 2007

I always thought it meant someone got free intoxicants. Won a game? Meh...
posted by Goofyy at 7:51 AM on December 13, 2007

What's actually interesting is that this joke has been repeated so many times that the joke itself is now in the OED entry for gullible (which does, of course, exist).

That's good. It's so good that I just updated the Wikipedia page for MetaFilter to reflect that line as one of the Top 10 All Time Comments.
posted by DU at 8:00 AM on December 13, 2007

Me and my old modem would like to apologize to you all.

But I caKß♦n't ╫╕ª

linß▀e noα▌▀is♠eΓπRµ♠s£/▀α╔╤

NO CARRIER
posted by loquacious at 8:00 AM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

Hey Look..I'm sportin' W00T!
posted by doctorschlock at 8:02 AM on December 13, 2007

::thumbs through dictionary:: Well, what do you know? It's really not in there!
posted by Faint of Butt at 8:04 AM on December 13, 2007

My respect for M-W went up a notch when I saw this. It's nice that they're recognizing such a clearly sub-culture-specific word as widely used. (Although not recognizing it enough to put it in their dictionary.) But my respect for them went down two notches when I read that they were giving credence to the stupid "we owned the other team" backronym. It's just a leetified spelling of the same generic hoot of happiness that we've been making since we evolved lips. Would they cite the fake folk etymologies for golf ("Gentlemen Only, Ladies Forbidden") and fuck ("For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge") with a straight face? I think not.
posted by Plutor at 8:08 AM on December 13, 2007

"Sardoodledom"? Don't see that one catching on.
posted by Camofrog at 8:11 AM on December 13, 2007

Did woot.com comment on it?
posted by empath at 8:18 AM on December 13, 2007

Ah here:

The Etymology of Woot.

Part 2
posted by empath at 8:20 AM on December 13, 2007

Yet another "computerese"/programmer/gamer term that people in the future will look back on with much embarrassment.
posted by wfc123 at 8:21 AM on December 13, 2007

The Real History and Origin or Woot and W00t.
posted by empath at 8:22 AM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

I like this. Just because around 2000 or so when I was a gamer, I started using woot in my work emails... "long debugging session turned up results" was a woot!, "tracking down some obscure network problem" was a woot!. I had to explain it a couple of times, then six months or so later my Boss Man starts sending emails with "woot!".

To this day, woot! is used when some long hard process is over or some sort of major breakthrough has been reached. The other common email is "done." or "done!" if it was important. I woot-itized my co-workers so I'm happy with the long due appreciation of woot.

woot!
posted by zengargoyle at 8:23 AM on December 13, 2007

w00t is so 2005.
posted by Mister_A at 8:23 AM on December 13, 2007

Beaten Once Over You Ass Hat
posted by BozoBurgerBonanza at 8:25 AM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

I was going to say that the quality threshold for new words is getting kind of low, but then I remembered 'truthiness,' which is one of the best new words ever.
posted by LooseFilter at 8:28 AM on December 13, 2007

I object to the mystery-meat style navigation in this post. It's w00tless.
posted by blue_beetle at 8:28 AM on December 13, 2007

I agree that it's probably from "Whoot, there it is." And probably before that from the Dawg Pound on Arsenio Hall. That explanation makes the most sense to me.
posted by empath at 8:32 AM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

Man, when if B1FF going to get his props? He should have trademarked all this stuff. LOLCATZ would owe him millions!
posted by GuyZero at 8:33 AM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

This is not made of win.
posted by Artw at 8:33 AM on December 13, 2007

Yeah, I say all the explanations I've read so far are wrong. I can remember when nobody was using it anywhere online & I was there for the first usage, which was by a top-tier computer hacker who used it as his nick on IRC starting around 1994. I'm working on getting in touch with him to ask him where he got it, when I get an answer I'll be sure to report back to y'all.
posted by scalefree at 8:36 AM on December 13, 2007

“Wow! loot” in the role-playing board game Dungeons and Dragons. The game, created in 1973 and released to the public in 1974, is unlikely as a point of origin.

That actually might be it.

Whatever. I remember using "woot" as far back as the mid-to-late 80s, back when 2400 baud modems were fast.

Don't let anyone lie to you. There's a direct correlation - a heavily overlapped Venn diagram segment, if you will - between owning a "modem" in the wee, squawky dawn of consumer telecommunications and personal computers and playing "role playing games". Not those torturous ladder-crawls you brats do these days online but real paper-and-dice stuff with real nerds.
posted by loquacious at 8:38 AM on December 13, 2007

Having M-W claim something you say as word of the year must be kind of like when you hear your dad humming a song by your favorite band.
posted by Killick at 8:43 AM on December 13, 2007

I dunno about all these theories. It's 133t-5p34k and, as such, has no one single origin. It's a subcultural thing and the origin of "woot" can no more be accurately identified than the origin of "duh".
posted by GuyZero at 8:43 AM on December 13, 2007

real paper-and-dice stuff with real nerds.

d00d, who needs paper and dice when a computer can do it all for you. Lamer!
posted by jmd82 at 8:44 AM on December 13, 2007

7h!5 5UCK5 4SS
posted by psmealey at 8:46 AM on December 13, 2007

Shit, I thought 'w00t' came from Teen Girl Squad (video). I'm hella lame.
posted by Pecinpah at 8:53 AM on December 13, 2007

This is the only thing worth reading on the subject of etymology. GuyZero, scalefree, et al., read Grant's post and his response to the various commenters saying "no d00d I wuz there it's a hacker thing!!" Bring a dated citation earlier than the "There It Is" song or you don't get to play.
posted by languagehat at 8:56 AM on December 13, 2007

DU writes: That's good. It's so good that I just updated the Wikipedia page for MetaFilter to reflect that line as one of the Top 10 All Time Comments.

w00t!
posted by not_on_display at 8:57 AM on December 13, 2007

Bring a dated citation earlier than the "There It Is" song
Can you bring a copy of the "There It Is song" that includes the word "woot"?
posted by Wolfdog at 9:01 AM on December 13, 2007

Languagehat: According to the Wikipedia it's not "Woot there it is."

Hear for yourself.
posted by drezdn at 9:02 AM on December 13, 2007

Apparently there are multiple "There it is." songs, though Tag Team's was the most popular.
posted by drezdn at 9:04 AM on December 13, 2007

drezdn: "According to the Wikipedia it's not "Woot there it is.""

So what you're saying is that language is immutable. Interesting theory.
posted by Plutor at 9:06 AM on December 13, 2007

Wow, it's amazing that no one actually read languagehat's article, possibly because they were in such a hurry to point out how wrong he is:

The story of woot, as we know it, is simple. There were two similar songs on the charts that year. In April “Whoot There It Is” by 95 South (Ichiban Records) was the number seven best-selling song in Central Florida, according, to the Orlando Sentinel. “Whoomp! (There It Is),” by Tag Team (Life Records) out of Atlanta showed up at number 15 on Billboard’s R&B singles 27 May 1993 and stayed for 45 weeks on the Billboard top 100, where it reached number 2. It was the more popular of the two songs.

posted by grouse at 9:07 AM on December 13, 2007

I'd like to apologize for my comments above, as I notice that hat's link discusses Whoomp there it is, and I had just glanced through the comments here and thought it was strange people thought Tag Team were saying Woot.
posted by drezdn at 9:07 AM on December 13, 2007

d00d, who needs paper and dice when a computer can do it all for you. Lamer!

That's right. Hand over the entire engine to some massive corporation who only wants one thing - to make money by keeping you online, grinding the ladder. No, they care not for storytelling. For it lame. They care about loot! Loot is good! You like loot. They engineer loot! Ignore the rules of the game - forget that the rules can be invented, too - whole worlds, even! Trust the computer. The computer is your friend!

Now just step right this way, Infrared class citizen jmd82. I'd like you to meet my Docbot. He'll fix you up real good. Don't worry. That's a medical chainsaw, and those are medical lasers. Won't hurt a bit.
posted by loquacious at 9:15 AM on December 13, 2007 [3 favorites]

grouse: "Wow, it's amazing that no one actually read languagehat's article, possibly because they were in such a hurry to point out how wrong he is."

I read it when empath linked it and I didn't mention that fact because I thought "wow, that's fantastic research" was a boring comment, much like this one.
posted by Plutor at 9:22 AM on December 13, 2007

Bring a dated citation ... or you don't get to play.

Sheesh. OEDWNED.

My citation is USENET which, unfortunately, antedates the "Whoot!" song.

My only point, which I'm sure you REAL LINGUISTS know all about, is that most people would not have picked it up from that song as a sole source. Actually, a very small fraction would have picked it up in that context. So my issue is that there's a break in context between the modern usage and the absolute first ever usage.

There is one usage in 1992 where "woot" is used in a string of other nonsense words "Harg! Glub blug dip woot-boof wammie!") but not in the sense that it has entered the OED. For some odd reason, that particular usage keeps showing up as part of one or two USENET posters' posting signatures.
posted by GuyZero at 9:35 AM on December 13, 2007

My citation is USENET which, unfortunately, antedates the "Whoot!" song.

That citation is from September 1993, but "Whoot There It Is" was popular in April, so it doesn't exactly antedate the song.
posted by grouse at 9:42 AM on December 13, 2007

Additionally, we have the zeros-instead-of-Os issue which well precedes either "Woot"/"Whoomp" song.

B1FF references go all the way back to 1990 (ignore the places where hex values of b1ff occur).

So the w00t aspect clearly comes from the BBS/USENET scene, separately from the usage of "woot" in general.
posted by GuyZero at 9:43 AM on December 13, 2007

That citation is from September 1993, but "Whoot There It Is" was popular in April, so it doesn't exactly antedate the song.

If "antedate" isn't just a fancy synonym for "comes after" then let me be the first to say "epic fail". September comes after April, right?
posted by GuyZero at 9:44 AM on December 13, 2007

Infrared class citizen jmd82

Mad, mad props to loquacious for dropping a hard-cord, old, OLD school reference to P&P RPG classic "Paranoia".

I gotta dig that out over the holidays.

Guyze-R-OOO, please report to the nearest Computer station for debriefing, delousing and incineration.
posted by GuyZero at 9:50 AM on December 13, 2007

If "antedate" isn't just a fancy synonym for "comes after" then let me be the first to say "epic fail".

I'm afraid it's actually a fancy synonym for "comes before"; the word you wanted was postdate.

You can say it now.
posted by languagehat at 10:32 AM on December 13, 2007

So predate and antedate mean the same thing?

Ok, I'm really getting confused now. This says that antedate and predate are antonyms. But that they mean the same thing.

You know, I looked it up beforehand. But apparently I didn't look it up enough.

Report for incineration indeed.
posted by GuyZero at 10:39 AM on December 13, 2007

If "antedate" isn't just a fancy synonym for "comes after" then let me be the first to say "epic fail"

You might want to investigate the meaning of the prefix "ante-", preferably ante-callingsomeoneoutforusingawordwhosemeaningyoudon'tknow.
posted by camcgee at 10:44 AM on December 13, 2007

Damn, too slow.
posted by camcgee at 10:44 AM on December 13, 2007

Infrared class citizen jmd82

I don't know what the hell an infrared class is and nor do I want to subject myself to your grimy dice and so-called "plot," but I'm still gonna burn your bloody lawn with my BFG9000 and break your cane with that chainsaw of yours.
posted by jmd82 at 10:51 AM on December 13, 2007

preferably ante-callingsomeoneoutforusingawordwhosemeaningyoudon'tknow.

Yes, yes. I've raised the ante with an antedate ancedote antidote.

Oh, and yes, "epic fail".
posted by GuyZero at 10:54 AM on December 13, 2007

Let me see if I can clear the air. Guyzero is right in that w00t has little ralation to the actual songs. You guys are intellectualizing this too much. It comes from street slang (black) which inspired the songs. "woot woot" was applied as an acknowledgment usu. from afar. A replacemnet for "yo what up".

The current street slang today is "brrrr" (as in the sound of an automatic weapon) or "bullet! bullet!" . It's used in the same way; as if to say "yo i see you, what up!". It eventually broadened to express delight, then traveled to the larger culture as alot of slang does i.e. "beef" "bling". That's when the computer users come in, then it was incorporated into l33t.
posted by Student of Man at 10:57 AM on December 13, 2007

fuck ("For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge")

That's not what fuck stands for, it's an acronym for "Fornication Under Consent of the King." It comes from Olden Thymes when you had to have a license to engage in sexual activity. Really, it's in the dictionary.
posted by arcticwoman at 11:50 AM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

l@m3rz
posted by kittens for breakfast at 12:00 PM on December 13, 2007

Pah, it's not even in the proper dictionary... which chose 'locavore' as its word of the year. No cheap publicity shots from the guardian of the Queen's English I'm pleased to say.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 12:39 PM on December 13, 2007

Sardoodledom has my vote. It's this year's underdog, at #6. And oh, what a year it has been...

Threat level orange?
Sardoodledom!

OJ's book?
Sardoodledom!

Britney Spears fan video?
Sardoodledom!

Senator Harry Reid's 'Thank You' speech to Rush Limbaugh?
Sardoodledom!

Feel free to use Sardoodledom! as you see fit. (exclamation point not required)
posted by iamkimiam at 1:54 PM on December 13, 2007

This says that antedate and predate are antonyms. But that they mean the same thing.

That's hilarious. "Predate" is listed as both a synonym and an antonym of "antedate" in that crappy thesaurus.
posted by grouse at 2:06 PM on December 13, 2007

What I find amusing is that languagehat is having exactly the same arguments with some idiots on another website somewhere, in perfect Russian.
posted by the quidnunc kid at 2:55 PM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

I have to say, it kind of disgusts me that this was picked. Then again, most of the new words were terrible.
posted by Camel of Space at 4:31 PM on December 13, 2007

That's not what fuck stands for, it's an acronym for "Fornication Under Consent of the King."

It may stand for that somewhere, but it's generally agreed that that's not where the word originates from. Sorry for the wiki link, that was just the easiest to grab, but I have seen this mentioned in many, many other places.
posted by psmealey at 4:56 PM on December 13, 2007 [1 favorite]

I don't know what the hell an infrared class is and nor do I want to subject myself to your grimy dice and so-called "plot," but I'm still gonna burn your bloody lawn with my BFG9000 and break your cane with that chainsaw of yours.

You're delusional. Have you ever seriously played a twitch shooter with an original Atari VCS joystick? That shit is excruciating. Ever have a real NES d-pad callous? Not some wussy-ass SNES rounded button irritation, I'm talking about 12 solid hours a day, thumb-mashing a pile of sharp plastic that has the response and accuracy of a drunken, angry, malicious badger with a severe biting problem.

You kids and your ergonomic joysticks and keyboards and your souped-up high precision optical mice and shit, and your team-play communication headsets. Damn. That shit used to be considered cheating, man.

Whatcha wanna lose at? Pong? Combat? Joust? Tetris? Which version - Arcade, PC, gameboy? Welltris? Worms? Sceptre? Doom? Descent? Freespace? HalfLife? MarioKart64? CounterStrike? Halo? Hell, pick a game I've never played before and give me 15 minutes to pick it up. I'll take you out like garbage.

I've got reflexes like a twelve year old Asian scratch DJ hopped up on shabu with the long gaming experience like some kind of freaky-old mummified arcade monk. I'm a cold born cyborg assasin. Clock-ticks run in my veins, my flesh becomes wired, the interrupts and collision detections are all mine, each variant false-physical world laid bare as a whole system to be hacked and gamed as a game in itself. You have no chance. Make your time.

Look, I love videogames. I like RPGs in video games - but rarely has it been done all that well, especially multiplayer or online. There's a whole lot of schools to it, now, and a lot of hybrids between strategy, real time and turn based RPG.

You want to see paper-style RPG done right on a computer? Check out Avernum. It a remake of the Exile games, and has gameplay very similar to AD&D 2nd Ed., which I frankly found excuritating as a paper game, but with all that crap nicely managed by the computer it's quite nice, especially when built around a huge world and a great story, with a fine attention to all the details behind the scenes that make it go.

Or grow a pair and play nethack. And go mad.
posted by loquacious at 6:03 PM on December 13, 2007

excuritating

excu... excurirriti... excrutiating.
posted by loquacious at 6:06 PM on December 13, 2007

Excruciating...ly embarrassing. Damn I miss the spellchecker.
posted by loquacious at 6:16 PM on December 13, 2007

*shuffles in, bows deeply, assumes contemplative yet alert defensive position*

I think you will find, honored sir, if you examine the matter deeply, that the word is actually excruciating. Perhaps it will help if you think of the cross, in Latin crux, genitive crucis, used by the Romans as the ultimate in cruel execution techniques. Your end, I am happy to say, will be easier.

*whips out concealed katana, slices loquacious neatly in half, bows, shuffles out*
posted by languagehat at 6:18 PM on December 13, 2007

*peers back, notices that loquacious's severed halves have managed to issue a correction before realizing they are no longer part of a living creature, bows again, more deeply*
posted by languagehat at 6:19 PM on December 13, 2007

Back in '87 or so we captured BIFF and handcuffed him to a tree and took blackmail pictures...

LOL web people... (and OMG I'm so happy that my old USENET posts have dissappeared...)

get off my lawn!!!
posted by zengargoyle at 9:03 PM on December 13, 2007

a friend just compared "w00t" to a hieroglyph. thoughts?
posted by paul_smatatoes at 10:32 PM on December 13, 2007

Oh, don't get all Latin grammar on us now, lh.
posted by grouse at 11:50 PM on December 13, 2007

Ablative absolute!
posted by languagehat at 5:43 AM on December 14, 2007