Do you use smileys while chatting ?

"A friend of mine, irritated by excessive use of emoticons (a.k.a smileys) by me once just blurted out,

“why the hell can’t you type ?? why would someone use so many symbols when he/she can just type ??”

I was almost confused and couldn’t figure out why would he say such a thing. Emoticons are best. Right ??

Well, I tried explaining my point of view but he couldn’t figure out my thoughts through those cute little emoticons (I seriously don’t know, how can that be even possible, but truth it is.)"

After this conversation with him where I literally explained why I’d always prefer emoticons over statements, I started thinking of reasons.

Why do I use emoticons??

Why does anyone uses them??

Well, a social poll using SocialE shows that majority actually give preference to emoticons.

Umm, emoticons are cute. But keeping that fact aside for a moment, lets answer, why emoticons?

Well, below is a list of why would anyone prefer smileys (and for those who ignore them, please allow emoticons to be a part of your chatting life)

1. Lets you know who is interested in the conversation because they imitate the way you write with more smileys.
2. You can get into a smiley war with anyone → Well, that really is an interesting war to fight.
3. Sometimes it can be flirty without being too much → That’s what winking smileys are for.
4. It’s more acceptable than ‘k’ or ‘hmm’ → Well, some of your friends might begin banning using words like ‘hmm’ and ‘ok’ coz you use them too much. That's when emoticons can be of help. There are too many emoticons to be banned.
5. They convey pretty much what you feel without writing it down explicitly → There are certain feelings, emotions, thoughts that can’t be written but emoticons fill that gap very well.
6. In the same way that a person’s voice or facial expression changes while having a conversation, a smiley face can be used in online chat and text messages to achieve the same result. It lets people know if you are smiling, laughing or upset or not very happy with the conversation taking place → This point might not be very valid for everyone, for example, when I’m very angry, I don’t use emoticons at all.
7. We react to them like we would real human face → You can really chat quite smoothly when emoticons are involved as you take it as an alias for a human face.
8. They soften the blow of a critique → You can just blow someone in such a mean tone & language and then use tongue out smiley. The person won’t be hurt, not much at least.

Still won't be using emoticons ?
Let us know here, coz your opinion matters.