Jill Harness
Sarcasm Mark May Prevent Miscommunications
by Jill Harness - January 26, 2010 - 6:55 AM

4275980331_7cdc41cce4_mI don’t know about you, but I never am misunderstood when I communicate over the internet. For the record, that was complete sarcasm, which illustrates one of the biggest issues with text-based communications — the inability of the writer to express the tone of his or her message.

Most people who have frequent communications over the internet know exactly how easy it is to be misunderstood without voice inflictions or facial expressions. Now an American company has finally come up with a reasonable solution to these constant problems — the sarcasm mark (pictured). This period in a spiral can help the writer indicate their sarcastic intentions. The company proposes you simply install the “SarcMark” into your computer, where it will automatically be programed to be entered into a document or email with a simple Ctrl key command.

Personally, I love the idea and could see tons of practical applications for its use, but I don’t know how I feel about paying $1.99 to download such a tool. Would you guys ever consider using it?

And has undetected email sarcasm ever gotten you into trouble? Who’s got a good story?

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Comments (37)

  1. While I think the idea of a “sarcasm mark” is a good one, I think the design shown is rather unnecessary. I think we should simply write the sentence and put a double period, double question mark, or double exclamation point to signify the sarcastic intent. Three periods mean a pause so it would be rather simple, or how about a slash separating the two marks? ./. !/! ?.?
    No changing of any computer keyboard! Ain’t I smart?/!

    posted by Montauk Lou on 1-26-2010 at 7:14 am

  2. Good idea, except it looks too similar to an @ (“at”) mark.

    posted by Gordon Daily on 1-26-2010 at 7:57 am

  3. I believe we already have a sarcasm mark without the need to install special software. It’s a two key combination -> ;)

    posted by Mark on 1-26-2010 at 8:06 am

  4. Oh a sarcasm mark, I’m so over the moon that a company would come up with something like this. It’ll solve alllll the problem I have with sending sarcastic email. :P ;)

    posted by Gavchap on 1-26-2010 at 8:08 am

  5. I’m still pushing the {sarcastic squiggly brackets.} They’re already on the keyboard and what else do you use them for?

    posted by Ben E. on 1-26-2010 at 8:10 am

  6. The squiggly brackets are used in pretty much all programming languages, but I can’t think of any other uses for them…

    posted by Nic on 1-26-2010 at 8:24 am

  7. My mom was recently nominated for an award at her hospital due to her coworker sarcastically suggesting it in an e-mail. He’s a lazy, ignorant jerk so it was even sweeter.

    On another note, I tend to only use sarcasm in casual conversations with people who know me well so they typically understand my intent. I would never use sarcasm in a professional setting.

    posted by Biolobri on 1-26-2010 at 8:26 am

  8. That was *really* helpful.

    Using the “*” symbols let’s you show sarcasm and emphasize words or phrases.

    posted by Tony on 1-26-2010 at 8:37 am

  9. What’s up with ‘/s’? As in:

    Yeah – because we’re really going to pay money for a new keyboard character that we’re never going to need. /s

    posted by Geoff on 1-26-2010 at 8:55 am

  10. The backwards question mark ØŸ, I think, is known as the ‘irony mark.’ From the wiki:

    “This mark ØŸ was proposed by the French poet Alcanter de Brahm (alias Marcel Bernhardt) at the end of the 19th century. It was in turn taken by Hervé Bazin in his book Plumons l’Oiseau (“Pluck the bird”, 1966), in which the author proposes several other innovative punctuation marks, such as the doubt point, certitude point, acclamation point, authority point, indignation point, and love point.

    Surely its form is essentially the same as the late medieval ØŸ, a percontation point (punctus percontativus), which was used to mark rhetorical questions”

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_mark

    posted by Ronak on 1-26-2010 at 9:00 am

  11. Oh sure…I’d buy it. Heck…I’d buy 30 of them and share them with my friends. I sure hope I can leave them a tip too!

    posted by Rus on 1-26-2010 at 9:39 am

  12. It isn’t an especially good story, but misdirected sarcasm (don’t even remember about what) got me in trouble on my first or second venture out of lurking on a mailing list. I’d said something slightly sarcastic and followed it up with a smiley. Trouble was, the person I was speaking to had never seen a smiley before (this was in the mid 90s when they were still esoteric) and got angry. I talked them down over about six or eight emails, and ever since I’ve avoided using emoticons. I use *grin* (or whatever) instead, because people who don’t know smilies can understand them clearly. It’s only in the last two or three years that I’ve gone back to emoticons, and even now I use them very sparingly.

    I’ve very rarely used the /sarcasm tag, but that’s another one that is unlikely to be recognized by a large subset of people, so I don’t always bother. Not sure I’d pay for the use of a symbol that has no guarantee of being understood.

    posted by R.M. Koske on 1-26-2010 at 9:41 am

  13. Geoff –

    The backward slash (/s) is a variation on the one I mentioned (/sarcasm). It’s a parody of an html markup tag. You start italics with either “i” or “italic” (inside angle brackets) and close it with /i or /italic. So sarcasm is occasionally marked the same way. Some folks go to the trouble of adding the starting tag and some only use the closing tag.

    One of the reasons I avoid it (besides confusion) is because I think it makes more sense if you include the brackets, but not all web-commenting systems will display stuff inside brackets – that’s for tags, so you obviously didn’t mean it to show. That’s why I didn’t try to include the brackets on either of my comments – it isn’t worth the hassle if they don’t work.

    posted by R.M. Koske on 1-26-2010 at 9:45 am

  14. …or was Geoff being sarcastic? You just can’t tell. Wish we had a clear way of showing it.

    posted by R.M. Koske on 1-26-2010 at 9:59 am

  15. Relying on a new character has too much friction for widespread adoptions. Actually charging people for the privilege of using that new character is WAY too much friction.

    As noted in earlier comments, there are already ways to denote sarcasm.

    posted by F. Andy Seidl on 1-26-2010 at 10:05 am

  16. I always use the old HTML tags to indicate sarcasm, and since most of my communications are with other geeks, it works… Sarcastic Remark

    posted by T Ferguson on 1-26-2010 at 10:20 am

  17. It works except on websites in comments where it is accepted as an HTML tag… “” “”

    posted by T Ferguson on 1-26-2010 at 10:21 am

  18. I’ve always used underscores to indicate sarcasm. Unless I intend for the message to be ambiguous. But, seriously, the design for that symbol, is _awesome_.

    posted by Tom on 1-26-2010 at 10:37 am

  19. Jonathan Swift never needed a sarcasm mark.

    If we are going to push for new punctuation I say the interbang takes precedence.

    posted by J Capone on 1-26-2010 at 10:41 am

  20. Doesn’t drawing attention to the fact that you’re being sarcastic defeat the point? The beauty of sarcasm, in my opinion, is the subtlety which doesn’t always translate into online communication.

    posted by Liz Teschler on 1-26-2010 at 11:06 am

  21. I don’t think $2 is an excessive fee. It would be if it were $2 per use. I’d rather have it on my phone instead of on my computer though.

    posted by Hannibal Schlechter on 1-26-2010 at 11:22 am

  22. Oh joy and rapture! Just what us witty sarcastic snarks have been waiting for – a way to clearly communicate our sly intent to the unwashed masses who didn’t get our jokes in the first place!

    posted by Anneke on 1-26-2010 at 11:39 am

  23. In the second paragraph, I think you mean voice inflections, not “inflictions”. Unless of course, you meant that someone’s voice is being inflicted on others, like shouting or perhaps really bad singing…(and I’m not being sarcastic).

    posted by Alex on 1-26-2010 at 11:52 am

  24. I my opinion, if you need to use a punctuation mark to denote when you’re being sarcastic, you should probably not be using sarcasm online or in messages. You obviously don’t know how to correctly or what, in actuality, sarcasm constitutes.

    posted by Lynnie on 1-26-2010 at 11:52 am

  25. Sarcasm is a tool used by those with weak vocabulary and writing skills. Insteading of creating yet another nonsense mark, we should be focusing our efforts to improve communication at an elementary level. Phrasing and proper word choice eliminates the need and confusion sarcasm causes when used in typed communication.

    posted by Katrina on 1-26-2010 at 12:11 pm

  26. No comments on this.

    Just a great reCaptcha

    outlaw corporations

    posted by Jan on 1-26-2010 at 12:34 pm

  27. @Katrina,

    Sarcastic much? :) (ha)

    And the above serves as an example for how I communicate my sarcasm. Note the emoticon as well as the side “(ha”), which should translate to “see! harmless joke!”

    I also use:

    “God, what an *AWESOME* use of my time” – capital and “*-*”, which I saw mentioned in above comments…

    More often than not, though, I’m e-mailing friends who understand my tone and that most of the things I say are sarcastic, so there’s minimal miscommunication. I suppose I could see the use of an icon, but I think that’s just a ‘get rich quick’ scheme for those sarastic/cynical ones of us. No funny stories about sarcasm, but my mouth has gotten me in trouble once or twice in the professional world…

    posted by OkieMelissa on 1-26-2010 at 12:56 pm

  28. I was called a racist on Facebook after sarcastically suggesting I would go turn on Fox News to be indoctrinated against “the Negro” and his liberal cronies in Congress. I was alluding to Jimmy Carter’s statement a few months back about many people criticizing President Obama partially because he is black (even if they would never admit it.) Because I put “the Negro” in quotes, I figured I was safe and that people would assume I was being sarcastic, but, alas…the conservative audience to which I was addressing labeled *me* the racist (and I am far far far from it.)

    posted by slcstace on 1-26-2010 at 1:20 pm

  29. For a second, I thought this might be about ESPN commentator Mark May’s bad attitude, and how it prevents him from getting his point across to Lou Holtz.

    posted by Dinosaur on 1-26-2010 at 1:29 pm

  30. I agree, Jimmy Carter is a negro!

    Hopefully the “sarcasm mark” or “smark”, as I will now call it, will die along with slcstace’s racism…you liberals are the worst!

    posted by graham on 1-26-2010 at 2:00 pm

  31. Aside from my innate distase for anything marketed with CamelCaps, this comic basically sums up what I think of this:
    http://www.sheldoncomics.com/archive/100120.html

    posted by Becky on 1-26-2010 at 3:27 pm

  32. Don’t bother paying. The \Irony Mark\ was invented a hundred years ago, why don’t we just start using that instead? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_mark

    posted by Neb on 1-26-2010 at 5:02 pm

  33. Oh yeah, that’s a “GREAT” idea! That little “miracle” of a punctuation mark is gonna solve ALL our problems! I am just SO happy. I’d be more than willing to pay an entire $1.99 for a symbol I could easily COPY AND PASTE. What WILL those “geniuses” in the think tanks come up with next?

    captcha: in writable

    posted by Elise Rivera on 1-26-2010 at 6:41 pm

  34. I agree with J Capone: if anything, I say we push for the Interrobang:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interrobang

    How many WTF situations would that come in handy, especially on Twitter ;)

    For the record; I, too, got a particularly fun Captcha too: pie rubdown :-o

    posted by @jodie_nodes on 1-27-2010 at 1:26 am

  35. it takes all the weight out of the sarcasm, a joke isn’t really funny if you have to explain it.

    posted by Peter on 1-27-2010 at 2:21 am

  36. I like to end sarcastic comments with a *end sarcasm*. Sometimes I spice it up with *end dripping sarcasm* or *end obvious sarcasm*. It not only lets readers know I was being sarcastic, but has the added effect of subtly insulting the inteligence of anyone who didn’t pick up on in.

    But I’m just a jerk like that.

    posted by Zed on 1-27-2010 at 9:52 am

  37. I third the interrobang!

    captcha: override message

    posted by notchocheese on 1-28-2010 at 4:50 am

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