How to Make Internet Smiley Faces and Symbols

Emoticons easily express feelings in written correspondence.

Emoticons are the standard for expressing feelings in Internet correspondence, whether it is through email or on a social networking website. The word is actually a portmanteau of "emotion" and "icon." The first smiley face, :-), to appear on the Internet is credited to a message board posting in 1982 by a research scientist named Scott Fahlman. Emoticons have evolved dramatically since, with expressions ranging from classic to complicated.

Instructions

The Basics

1. Make a smiley face to express happiness or good will. The smile comes in a variety of forms, the most common being :-). Variations include :), :], :o), =), =o) and :D.

2. Make a sad face to express displeasure or sadness. Frowned faces are similar to smiley faces, except that the beginning parentheses is used instead of the end. :-(, :(, :0(, =0( and :-[ are common.

3. Make a laughing emotion to express humor and mirth. :D, :-D, XD, X-D and =D are common for laughter.

4. Make a winking face to express playfulness or facetiousness. A semi-colon or asterisk is used for the eyes. ;), ;-D, ;D and *-D are common.

5. Make a skeptical or annoyed face to express your displeasure or uncertainty. Variations include =/, :-/, =-/ and :-|.

Symbols and Eastern Emoticons

1. Express your affection for someone by making a rose, @}-;-'---. A heart is expressed as <3, while a broken heart is represented by </3.

2. Express thumbs up or thumbs down by typing (y) or (n), respectively. They are not commonly used by younger people and are a reference to old DOS programs.

3. Use \m/ as a sign of rocking out to music. \m/ is a representation of the sign of the horns.

4. Use Eastern emoticons to change up your normal array of expressions. (^_^), (^.^) and (^^) represent a smiley face. (T_T) represents sadness or crying. (~_^) is a winking face. Eastern emoticons are considerably more in-depth and complicated than their Western counterparts.

References

• Original Board Thread in which :-) was proposed
• Computer User: Emoticons
• MSN Messenger: Emoticons