In Japan, users have worked out emoticons (text-based "smiley faces") adapted to their culture. According to The New York Times (August 12, 1996), the Japanese use emoticons even more than Westerners. Because their PC keyboards handle the two-byte characters of Kanji, users can choose between single- and double-byte versions of certain characters such as underscore characters, allowing a further degree of expression.
Here are some examples of Japanese emoticons:
| ^_^ | Smile |
| ^o^;> | Excuse me |
| ^^; | Cold sweat |
| ^o^ | Happy |
| *^o^* | Exciting |
| (^_^)/ | Banzai smiley |
| ( ; _ ; ) | crying |
| m( _ _ )m | apologies/thank you |
| (>_<) | angry |
| (+_+) | shocked/disappointed |
| (@_@) | ill/hangover |