Quote:
Originally posted by fondie
most of the information content in conversation is not contained within the words that are spoken but by the tone of voice, body language etc, for example, it can sometimes be difficult to distinguish between a malicious insult or a light hearted quip in mere words alone, smilies help to serve this purpose. they also help to brighten up the boards, a little light heartedness is a good thing in my opinion. a lot of hard work has gone into making these new boards, and lots of the time has been spent on cosmetic changes, and i think the smilies let down the design element of them down. also passages of text, such as this, become tiresome on the eye, or at least for me they do, broken with little animated pictures, is for me, easier to read.
Agree that some smilies lighten up the tone of the board and it gives people the flexibility of expressing the opinions with a touch of humor, but too many of them and too complicted ones just add load time, what with logos, ads, avatars, sigs, etc already...