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The smiley : - ) and its many variants are an important (and fun!) part of the worldwide online social culture -- allowing emotions to be conveyed in plain text. It has been in widespread use since the early '80s, when it was first proposed. Yet the original message in which the smiley was invented had been lost -- until now. : - ) After a significant effort to locate it, on September 10, 2002 the original post made by Scott Fahlman on CMU CS general bboard was retrieved by Jeff Baird from an October 1982 backup tape of the spice vax (cmu-750x). Here is Scott's original post:
19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman : - )
From: Scott E Fahlman <Fahlman at Cmu-20c>
I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:
: - )
Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark
things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use
: - (
This is to differentiate emails sent inter-departmentally from funny posts or jokes to work related matters, announcements, etc.. (blame all the killjoys in that department). So in other words, the Smiley started out as a code to tell people that the email they are sending is for FUN purposes much like the FUN tab in the publishing drop-down when your posting an article here in e-Sim. Apparently, there were people that can't take a joke, literally.
To see the post in context you can read the "joke" thread on the bboard that led to the invention of the smiley . For even more context you can view the full contents of the bboard from the October 1982 spice vax backup tape . Also, see Scott's page about the smiley .
Credits: Many people were involved in this computing archaeology success story. Mike Jones kicked off the effort in February 2002 by looking through some old bboard program (Bags) sources, figuring out the filename that the post would likely be found under (/usr/cmu/lib/bb/general.bb), and asking Howard Wactlar, the former CMU SCS facilities director, whether the file could still be restored. Scott Fahlman provided data narrowing the probable span of time during which the post was made. Howard and Bob Cosgrove, the current director, determined that backup tapes from that period (1981-1983) still existed and asked Jeff Baird of the facilities staff to try to find and restore the post. Dave Livingston of facilities located a working 9-track tape drive and a machine to use it on. Kirk Berthold and Michael Riley in CS operations managed retrieving tapes from off-site archival storage. Grad student Dan Pelleg's FreeBSD machine was used to read the 4.1BSD dump format tapes using a compatibility mode in the restore program. (Later in the effort a NetBSD machine was used to do the same thing.) Dale Moore looked for the post on Tops-20 backup tapes from CMU-20C. But by all accounts, Jeff Baird should get most of the credit for doing the hard work of locating and retrieving the data. He kept asking for more tapes, reading those that could still be read, narrowing the date range, and sticking with it until the post was found. Thanks all for your efforts to restore this part of computing history, and especially, thanks Jeff!
-- Mike Jones (who worked at CMU when the post was made and remembers thinking when he read it "what a good idea!"
September 12, 2002
from http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/mbj/smiley/smiley.html
Here's some of the press coverage that this computing archaeology success generated .
For more bboard history, see the full contents of the bboard from the 1982 year-end g vax (cmu-780g) backup tape , which spanned the dates 25-Nov-82 to 31-Dec-82, including a thread about changing the Arpanet protocol over from NCP to TCP/IP . Just input Ctrl+F and search for ": - )".
Redactor's Note:
To those who has read this before and is complaining that I just copied and paste, I don't care. If you actually read the post before then you would have noticed some changes..hehehe And to those who liked the post regardless, thank you for appreciating the time and research I did. What the hell. This only got posted because some random thought popped into my head "Where did the Smiley come from?" Anyways, I leave you to find a trailer about the movie "Smiley", just click on this word .
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More Pinoy Signs of Wit (11 years ago)
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USA as a world power? In E-Sim it is possible!
In E-Sim we have a huge, living world, which is a mirror copy of the Earth. Well, maybe not completely mirrored, because the balance of power in this virtual world looks a bit different than in real life. In E-Sim, USA does not have to be a world superpower, It can be efficiently managed as a much smaller country that has entrepreneurial citizens that support it's foundation. Everything depends on the players themselves and how they decide to shape the political map of the game.
Work for the good of your country and see it rise to an empire.
Activities in this game are divided into several modules. First is the economy as a citizen in a country of your choice you must work to earn money, which you will get to spend for example, on food or purchase of weapons which are critical for your progress as a fighter. You will work in either private companies which are owned by players or government companies which are owned by the state. After progressing in the game you will finally get the opportunity to set up your own business and hire other players. If it prospers, we can even change it into a joint-stock company and enter the stock market and get even more money in this way.
In E-Sim, international wars are nothing out of the ordinary.
Become an influential politician.
The second module is a politics. Just like in real life politics in E-Sim are an extremely powerful tool that can be used for your own purposes. From time to time there are elections in the game in which you will not only vote, but also have the ability to run for the head of the party you're in. You can also apply for congress, where once elected you will be given the right to vote on laws proposed by your fellow congress members or your president and propose laws yourself. Voting on laws is important for your country as it can shape the lives of those around you. You can also try to become the head of a given party, and even take part in presidential elections and decide on the shape of the foreign policy of a given state (for example, who to declare war on). Career in politics is obviously not easy and in order to succeed in it, you have to have a good plan and compete for the votes of voters.
You can go bankrupt or become a rich man while playing the stock market.
The international war.
The last and probably the most important module is military. In E-Sim, countries are constantly fighting each other for control over territories which in return grant them access to more valuable raw materials. For this purpose, they form alliances, they fight international wars, but they also have to deal with, for example, uprisings in conquered countries or civil wars, which may explode on their territory. You can also take part in these clashes, although you are also given the opportunity to lead a life as a pacifist who focuses on other activities in the game (for example, running a successful newspaper or selling products).
At the auction you can sell or buy your dream inventory.
E-Sim is a unique browser game. It's creators ensured realistic representation of the mechanisms present in the real world and gave all power to the players who shape the image of the virtual Earth according to their own. So come and join them and help your country achieve its full potential.
Invest, produce and sell - be an entrepreneur in E-Sim.
Take part in numerous events for the E-Sim community.
