Happy 29th Birthday Mr Smiley-moticon! *<|:-)

Through an exhaustive archeological dig of old back-up tapes sponsored by a crack Microsoft research team, it was determined that September 19th, 1982 was the exact date of the birth of the Smiley emoticon. (Not so celebrated, was the birth of his evil twin, the frowny face with the smile-turned-upside-down, who was born seconds later). The original message seen here was sent by Scott Fahlman 29 years ago today to a bulletin board community of Computer Scientists at Carnegie Mellon. At the time, it was intended to be a solution for graphically displaying the tone of a sarcastic comment to the reader. Critics complain Mr Smiley degrades our written communications, but Fahlman argues the Internet is a different medium than traditional publishing and we need to clearly define a joke or invite chaos and misunderstanding in this call-and-response atmosphere. Personally, I'm just so relieved I don't have to spell out "insert laugh here" anymore. :-) Read more on Smiley Lore here from Mr. Fahlman, the father of this happy little sideways ascii character.