Emotion Express Icon

They are mostly used in chat rooms online and in discussion boards. They are supposed to supplement the fact that text cannot wholly express how we feel, especially if we want to add some expressions to it.

Nowadays there are dozens of emoticons that are used for representing different human expressions. One caveat though, is that these are not usable in official circles or formal y communications. They are mostly jovial and suitable only for casual purposes, like between friends, co-workers and just members of the same online forum or participants at the same chat room.

Why should you worry about knowing and using emotion express icons?

There are a number of reasons. Here are some:

They Spice up your Conversations: In the offline world, gestures such as a smile, grin, a wink and others provide some sort of humor, when used rightly. But on cyberspace, every one you meet online is behind a screen and there’s no way of telling how the other party feels about your statements. Did he take them seriously, would he be offended if you say so and so things to him? Well, you can never tell. But you can change that by incorporating smileys into your forum posts and chat room wordings.

They Create a Feeling of Warmth: In the offline world, smiles, laughs and other facial expressions give a feeling of warmth, love and sometimes, hate and suspicion to those involved in the same discussion. Compare the following two statements for example, and notice the difference in how you understand and react to it.

a. "You know I don’t trust Britons that much"
Now this statement is very ambiguous. There is no telling whether the speaker really doesn’t trust Britons or he is just teasing his companion. It could be any of these two. What reply should the other party provide? He is confused.

But take a look at the same statement below.

b. "You know I don’t trust Britons that much. ;-) " This emoticons signifies winking. Here the addressee understands that the writer of the statement is teasing him, so he catches the joke and laughs to himself. Got it? :) (smile)

There are probably hundreds of smileys available online today. And they express different emotions, ideas, places and even people. So, whatever your mission online is, there is a very high probability that you will find quite a few dozen emoticon express icon that will fit in and spice up your forum writings and chat sessions.

By the way, do you know that a former living president of the USA has now been emoticized? Believe it or not but this :(=)  represents Jimmy Carter.