kook

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noun

A person regarded as strange, eccentric, or crazy: crackpot, crazy, eccentric, lunatic. Informal crank, loon, loony. Slang cuckoo, ding-a-ling, dingbat, nut, screwball, weirdie, weirdo. See wise/foolish.

[Usenet; originally and more formally, net.kook] Term used to describe a regular poster who continually posts messages with no apparent grounding in reality. Different from a troll, which implies a sort of sly wink on the part of a poster who knows better, kooks really believe what they write, to the extent that they believe anything.

The kook trademark is paranoia and grandiosity. Kooks will often build up elaborate imaginary support structures, fake corporations and the like, and continue to act as if those things are real even after their falsity has been documented in public.

While they may appear harmless, and are usually filtered out by the other regular participants in a newsgroup of mailing list, they can still cause problems because the necessity for these measures is not immediately apparent to newcomers; there are several instances on record, for example, of journalists writing stories with quotes from kooks who caught them unaware.

An entertaining web page chronicling the activities of many notable kooks can be found at http://www.crank.net/usenet.html.

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noun
/ku:k/ /ku:k/
noun

1: A crazy or eccentric person. (1960 —) .
Publishers Weekly A bona fide kook who is never quite able to get in gear till he finally dies paddling his canoe across the Atlantic (1973).

2: A novice or inexpert surfer. (1961 —) .

[Prob. from cuckoo noun or adjective.]

Previous:	konk, knucklehead, knuckle sandwich
Next:	kooky, kosher, kozzer

For a list of words related to kook, see:

• Behavior or Personality
• Insanity - kook: Slang. one who is odd, eccentric, or unbalanced

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See words rhyming with "kook."

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - skør kugle, afviger

Nederlands (Dutch)
verknipt/excentriek (persoon)

Français (French)
n. - (US) dingue

Deutsch (German)
n. - Exzentriker, Spinner

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - ανισόρροπος, βλαμμένος

Italiano (Italian)
eccentrico

Português (Portuguese)
n. - pessoa (f) estranha, excêntrica ou louca (gír.)

Русский (Russian)
чудак, экстремист

Español (Spanish)
n. - persona excéntrica, chiflado, chalado

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - knasboll, dåre

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
怪人, 疯子

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 怪人, 瘋子

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 괴짜 , 기인, 미치광이

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 変人, 気違い, 波乗りの初心者

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) لهجه عاميه تعني رجل غريب الأطوار أو مجنون‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮משוגע, טיפוס תמהוני‬

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