… time to watch the first episode of this season of Survivor that I recorded on Thursday but haven’t had the time to watch until now.
Correction… it’s actually time to go download it on bittorrent, because it looks like Emma deleted it after she watched it this weekend. 
16 Comments
you wanna make sure emma is well versed on the finer points of racial segregation?
Hey, how about a spolier warning there, since I haven’t seen it yet?
uh Jared? We don’t watch survivor…the “spoiler” is a widely known fact about this season…its been in the news.
here’s a spoiler for ya: you will die alone!
- triumph the insult comic dog (in no way actually directed at anyone here)
Lisa: I know, that’s why I put the smiley face. I could have typed out “just kidding”, but I was trying to be hip and use emoticons.
As for “triumph”, all I can say is I guess that’s a clear example of why I’ve never thought that dog puppet was funny.
your smiley was translated as “no big deal, i’m just sayin’.”
Have I mentioned recently that I hate emoticons?
ignorance is the root of all hatred.
I think this thread is pretty clear evidence of why they suck.
They’re meant to provide additional meaning / context to a statement, but since they can obviously be misinterpreted just as easily (or more so) as normal words, what’s the point? I’d rather just say what I mean in clear language.
communication generally requires a common set of symbols, no matter what form it takes. emoticons are no less clear than language. the difference is simply that you mistook the meaning of a smiley to mean “just kidding.”
i think your definition of “just kidding” is also off. it generally means that you were “kidding on the level.” when someone says, “nathan is a rrreal jerk…just kidding.” they probably actually do think i’m a little jerkish, i’m just not fully a jerk. plus, they don’t want to hurt my feelings, so they mask their freudian slip.
so i’d say that emoticons aren’t the root of the confusion. instead, it is the use of sarcasm in general that plagues communication in online environments. not saying what you meant is what was so unclear.
I didn’t mistake the meaning, since I wrote it. I think it’s pretty common to use the smiley face to indicate a joking tone in internet communication, at least I’ve seen it used that way a lot. If that’s not its “official” meaning, then that just serves to further illustrate my point that it’s commonly misunderstood.
Emoticons are always going to be less clear than words can potentially be, because they are limited while words are not. There are many thoughts and ideas that you could not communicate clearly with emoticons, while the same is not true with words. (Of course, you could argue that there are some things that words cannot express either, but none that emoticons cover). They are also much more open to interpretation than words are, by their nature.
I’d agree that sarcasm is usually not well understood or communicated online; I just don’t think emoticons do much to alleviate that, if they can be so easily misinterpreted.
So your bantor will end…I don’t think I saw the smiley face at all. It blended into the question mark. Sorry for stating shit (teehee)
my point: smilies do indicate a joking tone, but just because you say something in a joking tone doesn’t mean what you said isn’t true.
Agreed. In fact what I said was totally true, but I just meant it in a joking tone, since I also had heard about the racial split thing. But the important bottom line is that smilies still suck.
haha, so even now after all this we were still misunderstanding you. i think someone’s blaming their communication problems on smilies.
Not blaming necessarily, just showing how lame they are.