For most sites, smilies are a big part of both the software and the community. You can tell a lot from the smilies they have. Can smileys have an effect on how people post and behave - with "RTFM" or "Google it no0b" types or the more gentle smilies for hugs and kisses. How much of an effect do your smileys have on your community?
I love smileys! They've been a big part of my own experience of forum culture ever since I got hooked to this nasty habit I was fascinated by them when first posting on the Sacred International Forum, and when we finally got our own, Schot spent a ton of time tracking down smileys for us, eventually ending up with the Kolo ones or something. They are satisfying, expressive, and full of surprises. Course, everything becomes rote after a while, and I'm thinking that it could be nice to have some extra sets for special occasions. People love becoming empowered. When you offer smileys, you're expanding upon your community's vocabulary, elevating their level of expression via images. Turning them into super hero posters with natty new smiley powers!
I have a bit of a love hate relationship with them. gogoblender has put it better than I ever could and that's the side I love. My two pet hates are badly defined smilies and smilies that break line height.
To be honest I havent added any extra ones with XenForo, the default ones are fine as they are to convey most messages, I dont really need any additional ones like I used to, I think too many looks tacky when in a huge list especially older styled ones.
I think at adminextra we will be keeping in theme with the xenforo defaults. Once I finish up the extended pack we'll be applying them on adex. After they are sent to one of the devs at xenforo we'll apply them.
Personally, I think smilies are very important. As we are communicating via the written word we do not have the benefit of observing body language or voice tones so smilies assist in conveying the spirit of the post..
I love to have smilies on my site. They show what a user is feelling better then a text emoticon. Also Shelley should really make a smiley tutorial .
Without smilies, people might actually take me seriously when I get on a roll and start plowing through full speed ahead with the sarcasm saying things like "everybody knows programmers can code anything in mere seconds and just don't want to". "Everybody knows programmers can code anything in mere seconds and just don't want to". There we go!
No shit sherlock. << hopefully that doesn't lose translation due to the lack of smiley. Okay I have to.
But I styled your twitter bbcode. I'm just being humorous and your correct, in some cases smilies can and do convey a users emotion better than text. On the otherhand, in some cases the power of a greatly worded sentence can convey just as nicely, if not better and to the point. I think this could swing both ways and depends on the type of poster, person you are and possibly mindset your in.
Theres only a few I wouldnt use and thats them barefeet ones I prefer the full green alien personally it seems to fit in with the rest of the gang the most. I love the cross eyed tongue out one.
