happy 40th birthday of the smiley

Happy 40th Birthday of the Smiley!!!

 

Of course the classic punctuation smiley has been supplanted by cartoon-ish emoji. I admit the cartoons are more expressive and flexible (though sometimes you have to brace yourself for how they will have a different vibe on different devices) but I miss the old visual puns.

These are said to be the Top Five Favorite Emoji in the United States: 

But...bleh, I kind of hate both of the "laugh crying" emoji. It's just... I don't know, too much, it overdoes the thing. I use plenty 😃 to round off the edges of my casual writing, but the laugh-crying ones are trying to hard, like they seem dishonest, the LOL of the emoji world...

More on the history of the smiley at Lunduke