Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Add A Sarcasm Mark to Your Text Posts


Sarcmark Punctuation Mark
Sarcasm Inc. of Washington Township, Mich., has released software for computer systems and Blackberry devices that can be downloaded for $1.99. The software provides a mark that looks like an open circle with a dot in the center; or an upside down "g" or "@" symbol.

The company Web site states the reason they developed the sarcasm mark was that "the written word has question marks and exclamation points to document those thoughts, BUT sarcasm has NOTHING!"

Paul Sak, of Sarcasm, explained that "[the punctuation mark, as it is intended to be one] is roughly the size of other characters and with the SarcMark font downloaded, it behaves like any other font character. It specifically has a point or period incorporated in it, just like all other main punctuation marks: question mark ?, exclamation point !, colon :, semi-colon ; and of course the period."

I would imagine, however, that usage is going to be key for the adoption of such a punctuation mark. And I didn't see any support for a Mac! Although I'm not a Mac user, I still found that to be very odd. In addition to the hieroglyphic look of the symbol, which I find odd and uninviting, I'm having a hard time with the approach --$2? C'mon.

There at least needs to be a way for everyone to get a read-only access to this clearly revolutionary punctuation mark

The company made a video. It was so good it got high ratings


Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlwCCWGYOGg


Oh, this is such a great idea I can't wait to use this

Seriously though, rather than actually using language to express sarcasm online, now you can buy an “official” punctuation mark to represent when you try to be funny online with sarcasm, but fail miserably.

Use the symbol to illustrate your fantastic control over the English language every time you go online

The company said putting the SarcMark after an online statement will give the reader visual confirmation that the statement he or she is reading, is, in fact, sarcastic, reported ComputerWorld UK.

There have been a few previous calls for such a mark. The irony mark or irony point is a mark that was suggested to be used to indicate that a sentence has a second meaning, like in an ironic or sarcastic sense. According to Wikipedia the mark has never been used widely.

And in a 2004 Slate article Josh Greenman proposed the creation of the "sarcasm point." He wrote that it was time for the adoption of the sarcasm point because of the "range of sincerity can shoot from earnest to irreverent in nanoseconds" in today's world.

If you like the Sarcmark, the irony mark, the sarcasm point, then you're also sure to like the interrobang.

I predict that this will be a useless fad. What do you think? Do we need punctuation for sarcasm?  ▣

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1 comment:

Kelly Towle said...

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

Already available in Unicode 8-)