Posted on 09/18/2007 6:19:23 AM PDT by RayChuang88
PITTSBURGH (AP) - It was a serious contribution to the electronic lexicon. :-) Twenty-five years ago, Carnegie Mellon University professor Scott E. Fahlman says, he was the first to use three keystrokes - a colon followed by a hyphen and a parenthesis - as a horizontal "smiley face" in a computer message.
To mark the anniversary Wednesday, Fahlman and his colleagues are starting an annual student contest for innovation in technology-assisted, person-to-person communication. The Smiley Award, sponsored by Yahoo Inc. (YHOO) (YHOO), carries a $500 cash prize.
Language experts say the smiley face and other emotional icons, known as emoticons, have given people a concise way in e-mail and other electronic messages of expressing sentiments that otherwise would be difficult to detect.
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.myway.com ...
I think that emoticon of yours described Michigan fans after they lost to Appalachian State a couple of weeks ago. Isn’t it amazing how sophisticated emoticons have become?
Uh Oh! ... Challenge ... I think I might have typed that at the end of some my messages on the VAX/VMS system in the early 80s. I even used it in some of my homework on my Wilbur Acct. ... Where's OJ, I need to get some of my stuff back ...
Kind of describes the hard Left crowd conflicting with the Democrats in Congress much of the time.
;-)
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