Who invented emojis as we know them is debated, with some pegging it to the Japanese Shigetaka Kuritaresponsible for a mobile internet team at NTT DoCoMo, while others say that Nicholas Loufrani came before him. However, what is known is that Loufrani started with stickers to have more expressive text conversations and called them emoticons in 1997, while Kurita created the stickers called emojis in 1999.
With the popularization of social networks and an increasingly integrated world, there was a need to convey emotions and expressions visually so that communication would be more complete, which justifies their popularity. With this in mind, we decided to select 8 popular emojis that you use daily.
- “LOL”: This is an acronym used more by foreigners to designate laughter, as it means “Laugh Out Loud”. It began to be used in the 1990s in online chats and forums.
- “Hahahaha”: Here in Brazil, we use “kkkkkk” more to designate something very funny, as if we were “crying with laughter”. Onomatopoeia has its origins in the 19th century, when Joseph of Alencar (1829-1877) described the laughter of a character in the novel “Til” as “Quiá! Quiá!” The expression quickly became popular, and several other writers used the laughter in their works. As the language evolved, the onomatopoeia “Quá, Quá” began to gain more prominence, especially with the arrival of Donald Duck comic books. With the arrival of the internet, “quá quá quá” became “kkk”, both for its sound and for its practicality when writing.
- “Haha”: This is a way of showing a more shy laugh for us Brazilians, being simply the contraction of “risos”.
- “XD”: Very popular in the 2000s, “XD” is a way to express fun or something that made you happy. It represents a closed eye with an open mouth.
- Lenny Face ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°): This one appeared on the 4Chan forums in 2012 and quickly became popular on the internet during the 2010s. People use it to show a suggestive facial expression when faced with something.
- “Farm”: This is a Brazilian form that many players use to describe the act of repeating a certain activity to obtain some type of resource. The word originates from the English “farm”, which means to cultivate, and the Brazilianized form came from MMORPGs.
- “Dog”: Many people may think that this is a slang term from Rio de Janeiro that has nothing to do with games, but they are mistaken. Legend has it that “caô” emerged during the popularization of fighting games in the 90s, such as Street Fighter, in which when you win a fight, KO appears on the screen. It is used to designate a lie.
- “Nerf”: This is gamer slang used to indicate that some type of effectiveness has been reduced. It originates from the English “nerf”, which in turn means “to weaken”.
