The Newbie Anthropologist:
Appendix 4

Smileys

learn/faq #32, from jdally, 1161 chars, Jul 11 11:50 95
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What are smileys?

One of the biggest problems with text based communication is the difficulty in conveying emotions or feelings. A comment that is made tongue-in-cheek can easily be mis-interpreted as a sarcasm. A popular way of avoiding this problem is the use of smileys. A smiley is, or was originally, a group of characters which resemble a smiling face when looked on sideways. E.g. :-) A whole gamut of smileys are now in use, here are a few of them:

:-) Happiness
:-)) Very happy
:-( Sadness
:-(( Very sad
:-| Indecision
:-O Shocked
:-|| Anger
<:-) Stupid question
;-) Nudge-nudge, wink-wink,teasing
:-P Tongue-in-cheek
:'-( Crying
:'''-( Floods of tears
:-V Shouting
:-X Kiss - also, :-*

So, now you know - now get out there and remember, keep smiling :-)