Tag Archives: emoticons

My Top Five Emoticon Faces

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On more than one occasion I have written about my affinity for emoticons (here and here). While my love and heavy use for these cartoonish images run deep, there is a subcategory that I am obsessed with the most…the faces! I completely litter my text messages with the fun and silly expressions on yellow circles. Ahhh, the small lengths it takes to entertain me.

I use a wide variety of the faces. However, some particular ones I absolutely abuse. In tonight’s blog post I would like to recognize the five emoticon faces that I use way too much (presented in no particular order):

I am a real big fan of emoticon faces.

I am a real big fan of emoticon faces.

The Classic Smiley

Who doesn't love the classic smiley?

Who doesn’t love the classic smiley?

Let me start my list off with the most boring face to dominate my text messages. Even though it is the most prevalent and cliché emoticon, it is a classic and I love what it stands for. You can pretty much say whatever nasty thing you want in a text but if you stick in the classic smiley at the end you are good to go. But that is not the way I utilize it. Rather, I stick in the face to say “okay” or I use it in response to something funny that my texting partner wrote. I will use it if I write something that might sound hostile over text but really isn’t or I will use it at the very end of a texting conversation. You just can’t go wrong with it no matter how you use it.

 

Tongue Out Winking Smiley 

This is a great emoticon for when you are in a silly mood.

This is a great emoticon for when you are in a silly mood.

I enjoy using this face because I think it is a sillier upgrade on the winky face without the smile. If I am making an especially outrageous joke this is my go-to emoticon. If I want to lighten the mood with someone I also might send a few of these my recipient’s way. I mean how do you dislike this emoticon? It is cute, simple, and fun.

 

The Scream 

The Scream emoticon is my absolute favorite.

The Scream emoticon is my absolute favorite.

Without a doubt, this is by far my most favorite emoticon face. I love the way it looks and I love how it is so dramatic. I really think it carries with it a lot of power. Sometimes I abuse this power and overuse it way too much just because I think it is hilarious to do. But in normal conversation if someone says something surprising or if I drop some breaking news I am sticking it in. With Halloween coming up I will be using It more than usual because it fits the holiday perfectly. If you are reading this right now and you text me The Scream emoticon you will make me smile ear-to-ear.

 

Mouth Zipped Shut

I am not saying a word.

I am not saying a word.

I find myself using this one quite a bit. Usually I select the mouth zipped shut emoticon face in three situations:
1. I don’t know what to say back to what you said.
2. I am not 100% positive what you said was the truth.
3. I want to end the conversation.

But if I send it your way don’t automatically think I am doing it to be negative. Sometimes I just send it to mess with the other person.

 

Overdramatic Pouty Face

I get a kick out of the overdramatic faces.

I get a kick out of the overdramatic faces.

This is another face that I like to use because of its dramatic nature. One glance at it and you can immediately sense hysteria and disappointment. If someone denies me or if they report that something bad happened to them, I like to respond with the overdramatic pouty face. When people send it my way, I always immediately visualize what that face would look like on them if they were actually doing it while sending it off.

 

Honorable Mention:
Sunglasses Smiley Face

Sunglasses

Sunglasses

I have taken a real liking to this emoticon. I will send it completely out of the blue during conversations just because I think it looks cool. This explains the reason why I didn’t place it in my top five; I don’t have a specific use for it, I just send it off because I dig the sunglasses look.

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So there you have it. Please know that it is always acceptable to use emoticons, especially the emoticon faces, with me. Earlier I encouraged you to text me the Scream face. How about we broaden this a little more: If you liked this blog post, send me an emoticon face. If you did not like this blog post, send me the thumbs down emoticon! Oh how I love reader interaction. Don’t Blink.

My Trademark Texting Style

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Just like anyone else in this modern era of communication I rely on text messaging…a lot. Also, just like most people, I have my own distinctive style of texting. If you are a close friend of mine, you most likely have a good grasp on how I text. But if you aren’t in my inner circle you probably don’t. No need to worry, I am here tonight to reveal my text messaging playbook. Here are the top five characteristics of a text messaging conversation with Brent Reser.

1. Impeccable Grammar/Spelling: Besides the add-ins and quirks you will see below that don’t abide with normal APA guidelines, I do my very best to text with strong attention to conventional detail. I spell words out, I use commas, and I make sure my sentences have agreement in them. My brother, sister, and I all play a game where if one of us catches the other committing a grammatical or spelling error in a text we send it right back to the violator without even addressing what they said.

I remember the major grammar/spelling rules when texting.

I remember the major grammar/spelling rules when texting.

2. Hashtags: It should come as no surprise to most of you that I hashtag the heck out of my text messages. As I work in social media for a living and as I liberally utilize hashtags in my handwritten conversations it only comes naturally that I take the time to incorporate several hashtags in my texts. I don’t do it just to be different though. I firmly believe in hashtags as the best punctuation mark that exists. The ability to summarize and express thoughts with the “pound sign” is a great technological advancement and I make no apologies about using it every chance I get.

Use hashtags as if they were going out of style.

Use hashtags as if they were going out of style.

3. Emoticons: As I have wrote about in detail before, I am a sucker for emoticons. In fact, I have come to rely on them even more since I wrote my post on the subject. Just like the hashtag, emoticons do a great job at conveying emotion and thoughts that you otherwise would not receive out of ordinary text. I enjoy using them in large quantities and at random. However, I also take time to place them in clever spots to make the perfect text as well. I absolutely abuse the faces and my general rule of thumb is that if you always at least stick a smiley face at the end of a text you can pretty much say anything you want.

Basically anything can pass if you put a smiley face at the end of it.

Basically anything can pass if you put a smiley face at the end of it.

4. CAPS: For whatever reason this puzzles people a lot but I usually mix in at least one all caps word in each text I send. I usually fully capitalize either the noun or verb (sometimes both) in many of my texts. It makes my messages stand out and kind of serves as my number one texting trademark.

For every text message I am a big proponent of at least one word in all caps.

For every text message I am a big proponent of at least one word in all caps.

5. Question Marks/Repeat Message: Sometimes I am not as patient as I would like. If I send someone a text message and I don’t get a response within five minutes I might pester that individual with a string of 20 question marks. If I am feeling really bored and maybe a little perturbed I will hit copy and paste a few times and fill up the person’s texting screen with question mark galore. If I want to really insult the person’s intelligence I will do the classic repeat text where I send the exact same message back to the person that I had sent five minutes before. Come on, we all know how stupid doing this is as obviously the person received the message the first time. However, it does do the job of getting across a sense of urgency. But in all honesty I don’t really do it because I am on pins and needles and expect an answer right away…rather, I do it just to be a jerk and pull the other person’s chain.

This is a very annoying tactic that should be used sparingly.

This is a very annoying tactic that should be used sparingly.

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Now don’t you just want to get in a long text messaging conversation with me? If you haven’t already put my number on your block list I will let you know that I am really not that bad. I will keep you entertained and always clearly communicate with while texting. Just please, don’t make me wait longer than five minutes for a response. Don’t Blink..

Texting With Emoticons

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I will go out on a limb and say that emoticons play a large role in our contemporary text messaging language. Not something reserved strictly to teenage girls anymore, you can find pretty much anyone with a smart phone inserting emoticons into their texting conversations.

My guess is that most of you have seen emoticons before, but not all of you might know the term. At the start, emoticons were just facial expressions made by using colons, semi-colons, parentheses, etc . These days they are full blown mini pieces of clip art that people use to add expression and meaning to their text messages. To access a database that contains hundreds of these pictures, most people simply download an app that sets them up.

Emoticons are used all the time in text messages.

Emoticons are used all the time in text messages.

Remember five years ago when grammar buffs and educators were appalled and scared out of their minds about the prospect of the short hand ways of texting and instant messaging ending up in the academic arena? Well, because of the widespread use and acceptance of emoticons I think seventh grade teachers have even more to worry about than just seeing “IMO” or “BTW” on a report. I think they should start bracing themselves to see images of cats with hearts for eyes, Pac-Man fruit, and praying hands on the next term paper. I really don’t think it is that far off.

But besides the extreme examples of emoticons corrupting the educational system, what can they really offer the millions of people using them for their intended purpose (communicating via text)?

In my opinion, I like them. I think people can actually be really clever with them and make conversations fun. I think they do help add meaning and context to text messages, kind of a visual hash tag if you will. I further think that emoticons show engagement and interest by the texter. When someone takes the time to send a text message that took them six seconds to send because they selected an emoticon as opposed to three seconds to send if they opted not to use one, it shows that there is a level of care and thought.

Yes, I do think there is the tendency for some people to go a little crazy with emoticons. Sometimes it is cool to see people tell stories with a string of 24 different pictures but if that is primarily how they communicate then chances are I don’t text them on a regular basis. I also think care needs to be taken on what emoticons you send someone, as sometimes people interpret them differently. For example, I was texting my friend the other day and she responded with the thumbs up emoticon. To me the thumbs up image came across as sarcastic. Even though I knew I was reading too deep into it and she even assured me that there was no sarcasm intended at all, it became clear to me that emoticons can send mixed signals.

Personally, I am a moderate emoticon user. I throw in an emoticon every now and then to my friends but I don’t by any means rely on them. I am a fan of using the weirdest, funniest looking ones to randomly insert into conversations.

Emoticons will continue to hold prominent spots in texting conversations. The available database will no doubt just get bigger and bigger as time rolls on and companies keep introducing new sets. The opportunities to spice up conversations will continue to grow, something that I think is a great thing. I embrace emoticons for use in the casual text message but I am with all the academics out there…don’t ever think about inserting one into something that you are going to turn in. Don’t Blink.