Next, combine letters into syllable block following hangul rules. Q ㅂĪlright, let’s try to convert those letters into hangul. If you don’t have a Korean keyboard, see the layout of Korean keyboard compared to QWERTY below.
The method is by checking out which hangul letter is located at D key on the keyboard, then L, then S, and so on. How about the reverse, deciphering the meaning of Onew’s Instagram account “dlstmxkakwldrl”? Same principle applies. Now we know why and how they came up with such usernames. So, even though the word can’t be read in English, yet the username is perfectly comprehensible and easily remebered in Korean. On standard Korean keyboard, the letter ㅈ corresponds to W key, ㅣ is at L, ㅇ at D, ㅜ at N, ㅓ at J, ㄴ at S. One way to transliterate 지원 is “Ji Won”.Īlternatively, they may also simply type out the username as if it’s in Korean. Because Korean letters (hangul) are not allowed for username, they would need to transliterate hangul into latin alphabet which, to them, is foreign. Usually, usernames are limited to allow only latin letters (ABC), numbers, and a few symbols like an underscore. TL DR Answer: because they type it in Korean (hangul) but using QWERTY keyboard layout and hence, latin letters.
How many of Korean friends (or celebrities) you follow on SNS a.k.a social media such as Instagram, Twitter, or KakaoTalk, which have incomprehensible usernames like that? Have you ever wonder why they chose such difficult username that almost all of it made of only consonant letters? Why? Even though they look like they couldn’t think of any username and let their cats type it, this kind of usernames are very common among Koreans. See, those are real Instagram accounts of IU, Yang Ji Won, Kyung Park, and Onew.