I Write Out Emoticons as Words So You Can See Once and for All That They Are Neither Funny nor Cute

Gentle Reader,

I feel the need, nay - duty, to help end the scourge of the emotional icon in common text interchanges.

In the spirit of knowing thy enemy before charging headlong into battle, I offer this brief unmasking of some common "emoticon" warriors.

I trust this will better prepare us all for the dark days of hand-to-text struggle sure to come our way in the near future.

Read bravely; it is a not a pretty battalion I describe here.


1. less-than sign forward slash the number three

2. colon left parenthesis

3. hyphen hyphen hyphen hyphen less-than sign hyphen hyphen left curly bracket at sign

4. colon vertical line

5. greater-than sign colon uppercase e

6. colon uppercase d

7. greater-than sign less-than sign left parenthesis left parenthesis left parenthesis left parenthesis degree sign greater-than sign

8. semi-colon right parenthesis

9. left parenthesis tilde underscore tilde right parenthesis

10. colon asterix asterix

11. period period vertical line period period left parenthesis apostrophe underscore apostrophe right parenthesis period period vertical line period period

12. lowercase x period uppercase x

13. caret forward slash forward slash forward slash caret

14. period period period vertical line hyphen lowercase o zero hyphen period period period

15. colon uppercase p