Hey.
I see people on the forum saying things like "I own" and I think they are saying that they are good or something, but I cant quite figure out what it means.
I saw someone else had written "I owned you",
what the hell does that mean? They seemed to be saying they thought they were better than someone else at something. Is that correct?

I really am not down with the 'yoof'.
Sorry for my lack of understanding of 'forum speak' or whatever it is.

It's just an unpolite form of self gratification that tries to establish one's superiority over someone else.

If you see someone using such expressions in a serious way you know he/she's a childish idiot.

It is quite a weird phrase. It basically means when someone rules, or has beaten you. For example, you may see someone drag race another guy on LFS. The winner then may go "OWNED!" as if to basically say "i kicked your arse!". It can also be said when an accident. Like if someone falls flat on there face, you may hear a guy shout "OWNED!" across the street ().

edit - wikipedia is your freind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owned

Quote from cfus :

Hey.
I see people on the forum saying things like "I own" and I think they are saying that they are good or something, but I cant quite figure out what it means.
I saw someone else had written "I owned you",
what the hell does that mean? They seemed to be saying they thought they were better than someone else at something. Is that correct?

I really am not down with the 'yoof'.
Sorry for my lack of understanding of 'forum speak' or whatever it is.

Yeah - that's about right.

Or you can say 'I own at LFS'.

A common variant of this, is "pwned," presumably a typographical error, originally, since the "o" and "p" are next to each other on the keyboard, but the misspelling stuck. In some contexts, it is kind of an obnoxious (especially, if one is the loser of the contest) expression of triumph, but it is also used to convey the idea that something is impressively good; for example, in a discussion of movies, it was stated that (the actor, Gene) "Hackman pwns," expressing the opinion that Gene Hackman is a very good, and enjoyable, actor.


P.S. - I am totally unfamiliar with the term "yoof," and also, btw, "ftw," so I would be grateful if those were explained, too.

All true.

But it's spelled "xomfg pWNz0R'D!!!1".

In a certain IRC channel, a cup of tea is a cup of own... anyway, David:

yoof=youth
btw=by the way
ftw=for the win

NOOOOOOOBS! OWNAGEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!! PWNZZZ00RZ!!!!!!!!

Just yell at them back

Quote from Gil07 :

ftw=for the win

Now I always thought that meant 'Forward The Way'

god I'm seriously out of touch with the youth, I'm only 24 for crying out loud.

Cool. Thanks.

Other ones, with which I am familiar:

wrt = with respect to (meaning, pertaining to)
afaik = as far as I know
iirc = if I recall correctly

Quote from David33 :

iirc = if I recall correctly

I can never remember this one when someone writes it.


iirc (haha!) the word 'pwn' was a typo in the manual for one of the Warcraft games, and soon got something of a cult following.

EDIT: Wikipedia is your friend:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pwn (no mention of the Warcraft typo interestingly)