Emoticon

TEXTUAL VS. GRAPHICAL EMOTICONS

Emoticons consisting of printable characters are called ''textual'' or ''text-based'' emoticons, to distinguish them from ''graphic'' emoticons.

HISTORY

Background

In 1963 , the Smiley Face , a yellow button with two black dots representing eyes and an upturned thick curve representing mouth, was created by freelance artist Harvey Ball . It was realized on order of a large insurance company as part of a campaign to bolster the morale of its employees and soon became a big hit.

This smiley presumably inspired later emoticons; the most basic graphic emoticon depicts in fact a small, yellow, smiley face.

The earliest known non- ASCII emoticons were used in the PLATO IV program as early as 1972, which allowed users to type multiple text characters "on top" of each other. Many combinations of ordinary text characters were known to produce face-like patterns, which were used as emoticons.

Several Internet websites —such as Connected Earth — assert that Kevin Mackenzie proposed -) as a joke-marker in April 1979, on a message board called '' MsgGroup ''. The idea was to indicate Tongue-in-cheek — the Hyphen represented a tongue, not a nose. Although it has two out of the three characters of ":-)", its intended interpretation was different and it doesn't appear to have inspired the later smileys.

Every issue of the British fashion magazine I-D , founded in 1980, has featured a cover model with a winking right eye (or sometimes obscured in a different way).

Creation of :-) and :-(

The creator of the original , from old backup tapes.See Fahlman's website for a reconstruction of the entire thread

Internet usage

In Internet Forum s and Instant Messengers , text emoticons are often automatically replaced with small corresponding images, which came to be called ''emoticons'' as well (similarly, in some versions of Microsoft Word , the Auto Correct feature replaces basic smileys such as :) and :( with a single smiley-like character). Originally, these image emoticons were fairly simple and replaced only the most straightforward and common character sequences, but over time they became so complex that the more specialized emoticons are often input using a menu or popup windows listing sometimes hundreds of items. Often these menus go beyond the realm of emoticons and also have other objects such as musical instruments and can sometimes make sounds upon receiving the message.

An August 2004 issue of the ''Risks Digest'' (''comp.risks'' on USENET ) pointed out a problem with such features which are not under the sender's control:
:It's hard to know in advance what character-strings will be parsed into what kind of unintended image. A colleague was discussing his 401(k) plan with his boss, who happens to be female, via instant messaging. He discovered, to his horror, that the boss's instant-messaging client was rendering the "(k)" as a big pair of red smoochy lips. {Link without Title}

In many online computer games, emoticons are commonly used.

PURPOSES

Emoticons have developed over the years as a replacement for facial expressions and other emotional cues lacking in text-only communication; the goal is to avoid misunderstandings due to the lack of contextual information. Many books have been written on this subject, with voluminous listings of emoticons.

WESTERN STYLE

Traditionally, the emoticon in Western style is written from left to right, the way one reads and writes in most Western cultures. Thus, most commonly, you'll see the eyes on the left, followed by the nose and mouth. To more easily recognise them, tilt your head towards your left shoulder (or occasionally towards your right shoulder if the "top" of the emoticon is towards the right).

The smile is represented with a basic smiley :-). The Colon represents the eyes, the Hyphen is for the nose, and the Parenthesis is for the mouth.

Many variants exist with different symbols substituted for the basic ones. The symbol for the nose is often omitted, for example :) or ;). When the colon is replaced with the equals sign, =), the nose is almost always omitted (so one would not see =-), for example).

Basic examples

The following examples all use a consistent form, but each of them can also be transformed by being rotated, having the hyphen omitted, and/or by replacing the eyes symbol. An equal sign is often used for the eyes in place of the colon, without changing the meaning of the emoticon. In these instances, the hyphen is almost always either omitted or, occasionally, replaced with an 'o' as in =o). Lately it has become common to omit the hyphen, whether a colon or an equal sign is used for the eyes {Link without Title} . Please note that the definitions for the following examples are not absolute definitions rather a general idea of their meaning.

Variants

There are endless possibilities, because people are very good at creating and interpreting pictures as faces. See ASCII Art .

Some variants are also more common in certain countries because of reasons like Keyboard Layout s, for example the smiley =) is common in Scandinavia and Finland where the keys for = and ) are placed right beside each other and both need the use of the Shift Key .

Adding }}} before an emoticon converts it into a Klingon . e.g. }}};-) A winking Klingon.

A few people turn the smiley around, a "left handed" smiley (: This left-handed smiley can sometimes cause miscommunication though, since some hardcore net addicts tend to drop the : representing the eyes ) instead of :) so what was intended to be a smile could be interpreted as a frown.

There also exists the use of Umlaut s to achieve emoticons that aren't tilted to the side. For example, Ö is the upright version of :O (meaning that one is alarmed).

As more of a joke than anything – but also as a political statement – "frownies", the symbol :-( , were trademarked by Despair, Inc. in ''U.S. Trademark Serial No. 75502288, Registration No. 2347676''. The trademark applies only to "Printed matter namely, greeting cards, posters and art prints". In January 2001 Despair issued a satirical press release in which it was announced that the company would be suing "over 7 million internet users" who had infringed their trademark. They subsequently issued another press release a month later in response to the reaction their claim had generated.

.--- O.o O.O 0.o

Head and hands emoticons

These emoticons aren't rotated, they include the letter "o" for a human head, and slashes and backslashes for the arms.

They're also usable for displaying "animations", e.g. a crowning process:

: o/" _o

: o_ "\o

: o_ <ö

: o/ \ö/

Or for displaying how to dance "YMCA":

: \o/ ^o^ o< /o\

Recently developed are "handicons" to represent hand gestures. They can be seen either right or left-handed (the examples below are shown from the perspective of facing a right-handed gesture). Many variantions use "." as a knuckle instead of "n" or "m". For the other hand, one simply reverses the order of the line and switches the knuckle (< for left, > for right).

Posture emoticons

ANIME STYLE

_---), where the Asterisk s indicate the Eye s, the central character, usually an Underscore , the mouth, and the parentheses, the outline of the face. A large number of different characters can be used to replace the eyes, which usually is where the emoticon derives its emotive aspect (contrasting the Western emoticons' emoting through the mouth). The emphasis on the eyes is reflected in the common usage of emoticons that use only the eyes, e.g. ^^. Either a hyphen or a period can replace the underscore; the period is often used for a smaller, "cuter" mouth or to represent a nose, e.g. (^.^). Alternatively, the mouth/nose can be left out entirely, e.g. (^^). The parentheses also can often be replaced with Braces , e.g. {^_^}. Many times, the parentheses are left out completely, e.g. o.o . A quotation mark ", apostrophe ', or semicolon ; can be appended to the emoticon to imply apprehension or embarrassment, à la the anime Sweat Drop . Many other characters can be appended to also indicate arms or hands, e.g. <(^_^)>. Anime style emoticons which include the parentheses, mouth or nose, and arms (especially those represented by the inequality signs < or >) also are often referred to as "Kirbies" in reference to their likeness to Nintendo 's Video Game character, Kirby .

Basic examples

new Faces include: (^v^) or use v in place of _.

Complex examples

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Emoticon