Editing Leet (section)

==Grammar==

Leet can be pronounced as a single syllable, {{IPA|/ˈliːt/}}, rhyming with ''eat,'' by way of [[Apheresis (linguistics)|apheresis]] of the initial vowel of "elite". It may also be pronounced as two syllables, {{IPA|/ɛˈliːt/}}. Like [[Jargon File|hacker slang]], leet enjoys a looser grammar than standard English. The loose grammar, just like loose spelling, encodes some level of emphasis, ironic or otherwise. A reader must rely more on intuitive [[parsing]] of leet to determine the meaning of a sentence rather than the actual sentence structure. In particular, speakers of leet are fond of [[verbing]] nouns, turning verbs into nouns (and back again) as forms of emphasis, e.g. "Austin rocks" is weaker than "Austin roxxorz" (note spelling), which is weaker than "Au5t1N is t3h r0xx0rz" (note grammar), which is weaker than something like "0MFG D00D /\Ü571N 15 T3H l_l83Я 1337 Я0XX0ЯZ" ([[SMS language#Common abbreviations|OMG]], dude, Austin is the [[über]]-elite rocks-er!). In essence, all of these mean "Austin rocks," not necessarily the other options. Added words and misspellings add to the speaker's enjoyment. Leet, like hacker slang, employs analogy in construction of new words. For example, if ''haxored'' is the past tense of the verb "to hack" (hack → haxor → haxored), then ''winzored'' would be easily understood to be the past tense conjugation of "to win," even if the reader had not seen that particular word before.

[[File:Ami encoding.svg|thumb|"1337" represented in both [[binary number|binary]] and [[Bipolar encoding|alternate mark inversion]]]]<!-- [[File:Manchester encoding.svg|thumb|1337 as a [[binary]] representation]] -->
Leet has its own colloquialisms, many of which originated as jokes based on common typing errors, habits of new computer users, or knowledge of [[cyberculture]] and history.<ref name="goss 81">Blashki & Nichol, 81.</ref> Leet is not solely based upon one language or character set. Greek, Russian, and other languages have leet forms, and leet in one language may use characters from another where they are available. As such, while it may be referred to as a "[[cipher]]", a "dialect", or a "language", leet does not fit squarely into any of these categories. The term ''leet'' itself is often written ''31337'', or ''1337'', and many other variations. After the meaning of these became widely familiar, ''10100111001'' came to be used in its place, because it is the [[Binary numeral system|binary]] form of ''1337'' decimal, making it more of a puzzle to interpret. An increasingly common characteristic of leet is the changing of grammatical usage so as to be deliberately incorrect. The widespread popularity of deliberate misspelling is similar to the cult following of the "[[All your base are belong to us]]" phrase. Indeed, the online and computer communities have been international from their inception, so spellings and phrases typical of non-native speakers are quite common.