Wtf Illustrations

Internet slang (Internet short-hand, leet, netspeak or chatspeak) is a type of slang that Internet users have popularized, and in many cases, have coined. Such terms often originate with the purpose of saving keystrokes. Many people use the same abbreviations in texting and instant messaging, and social networking websites. Acronyms, keyboard symbols and shortened words are often used as methods of abbreviation in Internet slang. New dialects of slang, such as leet or Lolspeak, develop as ingroup memes rather than time savers. In leet speak, letters may be replaced by characters of similar appearance. For example, leet is often written as l33t or 1337.
Origins
Some of the terms and abbreviations used in internet slang appear to derive from fanspeak, the slang of science fiction fandom; which seems unsurprising, since a significant portion of computer programmers and users have historically been science fiction readers.