w00t: Merriam-Webster’s word of the year

Merriam-Webster Inc. has announced their word of the year. They have named w00t as their winner.

w00t is essentially an expression popular online to express joy. It is primarily used by online gamers.

The dictionary states that the meaning of this word is yay.

Merriam-Webster added on their choice: “It could be after a triumph or for no reason at all.”

The runner up word for this title was the verb facebook. It is based on the social networking service Facebook.

The meaning is to add someone to a list of friends on the Web site Facebook.com. It is also related to when you search for someone on this social networking service.

It is pretty surprising that the words being selected are not even in the traditional editions of the English language dictionaries.

Checkout: Merriam-Webster Online