-8

Let's talk about leetspeaking!

The definition of leetspeak:

An informal language or code used on the internet, in which standard letters are often replaced by numerals or special characters that resemble the letters in appearance.

Now I'm sure there are a handful of users who will speak leet in certain sites, but my current state in Meta SE won't get me to post there, so Arqade will do, because there are a handful gamers who will speak leet.

It is already forbidden to use leet in questions/answers, but would it be the same for comments? Just wondering.

Is leetspeak allowed in comments?

6
  • For experimentation, here I go.
    – Mark Giraffe
    Mar 16, 2021 at 15:45
  • //3\\32 60////4 6!\\3 '/0L| L||*, //3\\32 60////4 137 '/0L| ]0\\\//, //3\\32 60////4 2L|// 420L|//|] 4//|] |]35327 '/0L|.
    – Mark Giraffe
    Mar 16, 2021 at 15:45
  • 6
    Why? What problem are you solving?
    – Wrigglenite
    Mar 16, 2021 at 16:16
  • @Wrigglenite No problems whatsoever. Just wanted an answer because I wondered about this.
    – Mark Giraffe
    Mar 16, 2021 at 17:18
  • 1
    I think you're just trying to push boundaries, for some reason. Personally I don't see any reason in asking this, not even a "wonder" about it. Very confused.
    – nightsurfer
    Mar 17, 2021 at 15:11
  • If leetspeak is an aspect of a game then you can ask about that specific instance. However, your question should be written using English words. If you write your question using leet then most people would probably flag you as spam and you would alienate most people from reading your post. What is your goal for using leet? Why not klingon or meme-speak?
    – MonkeyZeus
    Mar 19, 2021 at 14:58

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
5

The whole point of StackExchange sites is to provide useful information to the whole community. We're not a discussion forum, we're a knowledge base or FAQ place, of sorts, and we want our posts to be understandable by everyone and ongoing discussions about those posts to be public for everyone.

We do allow informality up to a certain extent, but this is taking it too far. My friend Penguin speaks in gamer talk almost everywhere, which I think is okay because it's still understandable. The important thing is that the gamer talk doesn't spread to their questions and answer posts, because that's the most important part of SE sites.

Imagine reading one of our questions, and the answers were in both English and Chinese! It would take a very long time to translate the languages into one you can understand. We want our answers to be easy to read and understand, right off the top! That's why we don't allow languages other than English on our network, because English is the primary language of the internet, and we want our posts to be understandable by the whole community, not just you!

As for comments, when you put your comments in LeetSpeak, it may be cool to you, but it's not cool to others who don't want to have to learn LeetSpeak to find out what you're saying. As I said earlier, we'd like discussion to be public, and when you talk in a foreign language, it's like speaking in cipher code: you're trying to make your discussion private, which goes against the model of StackExchange—to make this a free, open, and public knowledge base that can be read by anyone.

If you want to goof off and chat in leetspeek with fellow members of Arqade, the chat may be a better option for you, however they may be a publicity requirement, so even there it may not be acceptable.

1
  • 1
    The only instance where I think this might be even somewhat remotely acceptable would be Puzzling SE. It is common (expected even) to post cyphered comments when discussing answers to a puzzle. However they simply use Rot13 because it's a lot easier to decipher
    – Wondercricket
    Mar 17, 2021 at 1:16

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .