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Emoticon-fusion

biggie528
biggie528
Lucky Stiff

Apr-19-2007 12:21

Ok, I've noticed lately that there's some crazy emoticons going on. Call me old school, but I have a hard enough time with :) and ;)

Someone PLEASE help me out and explain to me the following:

^_^

o_O

XD

Anyone else have some confusing ones you don't get or ones you can explain to us old fogies who have NO idea what they mean?

Replies

AndreaX
AndreaX
Thespian

Apr-19-2007 14:04

Ahem. This from someone older than u even!

Users from East Asia popularized a style of emoticons that can be understood without turning one's head to the left.

These emoticons are usually found in a format similar to (*_*), where the asterisks indicate the eyes, 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. ^^. Characters like hyphens or periods 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. ^^ or oO.

SO!

^-^ is the :) equivalent

o_O is confused/surprised/disturbed (think of it as a one arched eyebrow thing)

XD = laughing hard.

AndreaX
AndreaX
Thespian

Apr-19-2007 14:06

*hopes everyone notices just how good she is at wikipediaing*

Breitkat
Breitkat
Pinball Amateur

Apr-19-2007 14:09

(tilts head to the right in confusion....just to be different ;-)

AraLives
AraLives
Battered Shoe

Apr-19-2007 16:17

Was about to ask if you'd written your thesis on this topic, Andrea. Nice wikipediating!

Secret_Squirrel
Secret_Squirrel
Safety Officer

Apr-19-2007 16:58

I like to just make it up... XD I had interpreted as a cannibal smiling. (the X being the bones in his/her hair). o_O was I thought an admission of a badly botched breast augmentation :s and ^-^ i thought looked like a spider from front on. Sure none of them fit into conversation really well, but it's more fun I guarantee.

cfm
cfm
Nomad

Apr-19-2007 18:34

I also understood the ^_^ smiley family comes from asia and is closely tied to anime. I have cat friend who uses them often and even adds a tail. I just pretend I know what she's doing,because I really have no clue.

It took me 20 minutes to figure out the flower one, I think its @>--, the first time I saw it.

Yes, I'm old and proud of it!

*sticks to writing out flowery details instead of cutsie symbols*

yoyofoshow
yoyofoshow
Old Shoe

Apr-20-2007 03:24

I'm with cfm, I like good ol letters and words too.

Vampiric Lust
Vampiric Lust

Apr-20-2007 05:04

-uses these a lot.-

Also, the "XD" is normally "xD".

>_>;

And I think the flower is like -----^---((@ or something.


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