word of the year

Everybody knows that Merriam-Webster does NOT have any sway when it comes to picking the word of the year. That honor belongs to The American Dialect Society (whose choice I am eagerly awaiting).

But M-W picks a word, anyway, and as far as I can tell, they pretty much just randomize these. The winner this year is "w00t." Apparently it has zeroes instead of o's.

From Boing Boing.

w00t is Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year for 2007

Voters at Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year 2007 poll have chosen "w00t" as 2007's most iconic word. M-W says that the word is a gamer's acronym for "we own the other team," but I'm inclined to think that that's a backronym, a back-formed acronym created to explain a word already in use.

1. w00t (interjection)
expressing joy (it could be after a triumph, or for no reason at all); similar in use to the word "yay"

w00t! I won the contest!

Among the other words in the top ten were such lame-ohs as "facebook," "conundrum," "apathetic," "hypocrite," and "charlatan." Though this list may reflect a certain cultural and ideological moment in America, the words are hardly interesting--certainly not worth of attention. The only word that I think even deserves mention is "Pecksniffian." My dad uses this word a lot, which leads me to believe that Bill O'Reilly uses it. Which makes sense, because Bill O'Reilly's a Pecksniffian bastard.