Define Meta Meaning

1. Meta means about the thing itself. It's seeing the thing from a higher perspective instead of from within the thing, like being self-aware.

2. A term used in mmo meaning the Most Effective Tactic Available. It's basically what works in a game regardless of what you wish would work.

1. Shortened for of "metagame". In any kind of competitive gaming, there exists a kind of extra game on top of the game. Certain tactics are found to be very effective, and because of that, counters to those tactics become effective, and so on. The current state of the interactions between all these tactics is referred to as "the metagame" for a particular game.

2. Self-referential. In film and television, the lexicon has adopted meta to mean anything in a film or TV show that references films or TV shows.

3. Generally, any approach that discusses the sub approaches in a field or media. Metafiction, for example, plays off the expectations of the audience to surprise and delight them.

A metaverse is a collection of multiple complete fictional universes.

Metadata is the data that describes your data (e.g. in the statement "you have 10 gigs of videos stored on your hard drive", the videos are the data and the information that there are 10 gigs, and that they're on your hard drive is metadata)

A term, especially in art, used to characterize something that is characteristically self-referential.

1. meta 581 up, 58 down
A term, especially in art, used to characterize something that is characteristically self-referential.


"So I just saw this film about these people making a movie, and the movie they were making was about the film industry..."
"Dude, that's so meta. Stop before my brain explodes."

When you create new layers of abstraction between the thing or event, you are becoming more meta.

For example: A footnote that is needed to explain another footnote is meta.

The problem with being meta is that if you add sufficient layers of abstraction or complexity between the original event and the convenient abstractions you create to clarify or explain it, you eventually lose all connection to the original. Generally, you need no more than two or three levels in writing.

Too much meta in your writing leads to meta fog.

In writing, this means your writing sucks.

When in any form of art; whether it be a story, video game, picture, movie, etc.; the story is explaining itself.

Meta-HTMLTM is a programming language specifically designed for working within the World Wide Web environment. Although it is a genuine programming language, suitable for large-scale symbolic manipulation, it provides the most commonly wanted Web functionality as built-in primitives, so you don't have to write them.
Check out The White-Paper Manifesto (circa 1996)

a reddit term used to describe posts in a subreddit about or referencing the state of it

An adjective used to desribe something that might be a stretch, that is, an overly indirect relationship. I.e. metaphysics, where relationships are extrapulated between mind and matter.

A super search engine that combines the results from all search engines into one big results page.