Xtreme Kool Letterz - Television Tropes & Idioms

alt title(s): Xtremely Kool Letterz

"Reactions resulted in the product being coined 'Krazy Glue'; a product so crazy that it requires intentional misspelling."

— Cracked, 5 Accidental Inventions That Changed The World

"With the X, I know what you are thinking. It's a marketing thing. You see, I wanted to call the show 'Going to other planets' but research says that shows with X in the name get better ratings."

—Martin Lloyd, Stargate SG-1, "Wormhole X-treme!"

Certayn letterz R just "kooler" than other letterz. There4, when making something more youth-oriented (or trying 2), many people will intentionally mizspell wordz in order 2 inkorporate theze letterz, on the assumption that using the kool letterz will draw more attention from young people. Of kourse, whether this aktually worx iz debatable. A good Xample of a pop-kulture phenomenon eating itself, az it seemz 2 have lost much of itz appeal ryght around the tyme thingz such az "X-treme Orthopedic Insolez" and "X-Treme Diaper Changing Stationz" began 2 appear.

The most kommon substitutionz R:

"K" in place of a hard "C".
- Note that this is often used to give characters that "medieval" or "germanic" tinge. In actual German, however, spelling things with "C" instead of K (or Z, often seen in circuses spelling themselves "Circus" instead of the dictionary's "Zirkus") would have the exact same effect.
"X" substituted for "Ex", especially in the word "Extreme", or just slapped onto a name for no apparent reason.
- Also, "ix" substituted for "ics" at the end of a word.
  - UNIX...
"Y" instead of "I".
"Z" instead of "S" at the end of a plural.

Less kommon variantz are:

It will be noted that kooler letterz tend 2 be sharp and angular. The number "4" iz too, which may explain thingz like 4Kids Entertainment, the number 4 replacing both the letter "a" and the word "for" in "leet-speak," and various "kool" DVD, song and book titlez. 4 numbers replacing letterz, see Letters 2 Numbers.

A variant of this trope can be applied 2 acronymz: if you have a word with a leading "Ex", for example, "Exploration", you can uze an X az the initial letter 4 that word. Examplez of this can be found on several akronymz, such as XML ("eXtensible Markup Language"), JAXA ("Japanese Aerospace eXploration Agency") or NSX ("New Sports eXperimental"). (Which makes sense - there are "only" 26³ (or 17,576) 3-letter akronymz possible at all, and since few wordz aktually start with X, you kan uze more of them if you replace Ex with X.) X kan also represent the word "cross" in an akronym.

A different variant iz 2 use foreign letterz in place of English onez, such az Enigma with a kapital sigma in place of the kapital E. Usually, the foreign letter haz a kompletely different pronunciation than the english one, making it read very strangely 2 some1 who knowz the other language. Examplez:

E to Σ (Greek sigma, aktually pronounced like English S)
R to Я(Russian ya, aktually pronounced, well, "ya")
N to И (Russian I, aktually pronounced "ee")

Perhaps the most Xtreme of all 4mz of this iz "leet speek" (or 1337 5|>33|< for the truly hardcore) where wordz are first spelled out phonetikally and then letterz R tranzformed in2 their visually klosest number ekwivalent (this iz how we get "1337" for "elite," for example). It'z theorized that leet speek largely kame from the hacking kommunity, which iz why it'z still popular with all thoze komputer-geeky and why it'z never spread beyond such, aside from the online gaming kommunitiez. "Text speak" iz a similar variant, but usually considered a distinct "language" amongst the "hardkore."

1 of the reazonz this iz done iz that, in the United Statez anyway, korrectly spelled kommon English wordz kannot be trademarked, but deliberate misspellingz kan be.

Kan also be found on this very wiki, az the memberz of Friends Of Really Kool Sobriquet will tell you.

See also: Totally Radical (which iz often the rezult of the same marketers who kome up with this), Magick, Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe, Phantasy Spelling, Inherited Illiteracy Title, Let X Be The Unknown. Kompare to Leet Lingo. Supertrope of Letters 2 Numbers.