(RNN) - Ahoy, matey! Today be a day of great importance. Two memes of the World Wide Web are uniting sea dogs and tech swabs alike.
Sept. 19 is International Talk Like a Pirate Day and the 30th anniversary of the emoticon. You know, the bilge that finishes yer sentences and Facebook updates: Avast! Good times and good grog with me buckos! : )
The smiley face, which causes many an internet users to grumble "Arrrr!" because it comes after something you don't want to read, is credited to a swab at Carnegie Mellon University by the name of Jack Sparrow.
No, not really, but it would be cool if that were true. : -)
Scott E. Fahlman was a computer science graduate student posting on a general board and wrote:
I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:
: - )
Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use
: - (
The scaliwags who invented Talk like a Pirate Day go by the names Ol' Chumbucket (John Baur) and Cap'n Slappy (Mark Summers), two mates from Albany, OR, who started insulting each other in pirate-speak while playing the very pirate sport of racquetball.
If you're lost on how to do so, their website has a translator.
It seems many are on board for the pirate speak – Facebook offers an option to change your language to "pirate" and the Obama campaign wants to know, "Arrr you in?"
No word from Romney yet – sad face.
Copyright 2012 Raycom News Network. All rights reserved.
Mark Summers (Cap'n Slappy) and John Baur (Ol' Chumbucket) are the founders of Talk Like a Pirate Day.
Two memes come together as one.
The Obama campaign courting the pirate vote on their Twitter feed. (Source: Twitter)
All content © Copyright 2000 - 2013 WorldNow and WSFA, a Raycom Media Station.
