About Woot
Woot, formerly Synapse Micro, got its start in 1994 selling computer parts to
mom-and-pop computer stores for lower prices than the latest models. 
By 2001, the company had expanded to larger big box retailers. As the company's product offerings grew, so did its excess inventory. So, what started as a pet project in 2004, by founder Matt Rutledge, ended up changing the company forever, and was the beginning of Woot.
The concept? Take this excess inventory and start an employee-store slash market-testing type of place for electronics, but it's taken on a life of its own.
Woot.com was born
Woot.com debuted on July 12, 2004, and is based on a simple concept that it still uses today: To sell only one product a day until the inventory runs out or the clock strikes midnight, whichever comes first.
At first Rutledge saw this as a way to unload overstocked merchandise from his Dallas-based wholesale consumer electronics business. From the very start, the site prided itself on its brutal honesty: If a vacuum cleaner was a putrid shade of green, Woot said so. Soon people came to the site just to read the snarky product descriptions. Today, Woot has six sites, 2.5 million registered members.
Woot Wholesale now has a unique advantage
As a long-standing distributor, we understood the wholesale market, but now we have an unmatched advantage – the buying power necessary to provide not just closeouts but “Woot-powered deals” to our retail partners via bulk deals. This gives you ability to draw traffic and create excitement during a short promotional period.
Does it work? We’re doing this every day with nearly 70% of the top US Retailers in electronics, home audio, house wares, sporting goods, toys, tools, gaming, media, and specialty items.
That’s all well and good but I still don’t know what a Woot is
Some claim "woot" was originally a hacker term for root (or administrative) access to a computer, while others insist it was a truncated expression common among role-playing gamers for "Wow, loot!" Regardless of its origins, as the term came into use popular on the Net and in video game communities it has broadened into a general term of excitement. "I defeated the dark sorcerer! Woot!"