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[–] TAThatBoomerang [S] 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

Alright, I gotta ask before it's gone so far I'm afraid to ask, what does "KEK" actually mean?

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[–] Warden 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

kek = gaming version of lol

So, in WoW you have the Horde and the Alliance. Whether you choose one or another, you can't talk to a guy from the other "faction", because typed text is run through an in-game translator. Typing "lol" results in "kek" for enemy players.

Also in Korean, ㅋ stands for "k" sounds, raspy, stifled laughter; so 3 together "ㅋㅋㅋ" is like "hahaha". In Starcraft, the onomatopoeia ㅋㅋㅋ was written as "kekeke", because the game didn't support Korean language at launch.

"lel" is another one of those, but no gaming background. Someone changed "e" for "o" and thought it meant the same.

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[–] Ulluses 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

It has a few sources, but the most well known is that World of Warcraft translated text speech between factions into gibberish unless you learned the language back in the day. "LOL" was translated to "KEK". There's some other sources like some languages using "kekekeke" instead of "hahahahaha" and so on. So when people use Kek they are just laughing, although by the comparison to Lol they are likely only barely smiling. The popularity of the Kek response is driven by it's varied roots from language, to gaming culture and it's wide acceptance by 4chan and 8chan like sites, along with it's verbal sound "Kek" is somewhat like the single strangled laugh that escapes people's lips when they are trying not to laugh.