Love and IM in Vietnam
December 2, 2008 on 10:02 am | In Fun Stuff | 13 Comments
I came across a story on CNET today by Dong Ngo, an editor that is spending a month in Vietnam. While there, he is writing about how technology has permeated their culture. In his latest post, “Looking for love in Vietnam: Don’t forget to : )”, Ngo discusses how integrated technology is with the dating scene.
“Love, or the lack thereof, is an ongoing global issue. I offer no solution, but if you want to look for the one here in Vietnam, a word of advice: learn to text and know your emoticons.”
Ngo confesses that while text messaging is a simple endeavour, he is intimidated by instant messaging. This is because a lot of the Yahoo! Messenger emoticons mean something different to the Vietnamese. “Though most Yahoo IM emoticons are designed to mean something that’s widely understood, there are some that are interpreted here entirely differently from what they are originally designed to mean.”
Here’s a quick look at how the Vietnamese have re-interpreted some of our emoticons:
“Time out!” in Vietnam is known as “I am going to hammer you on the head”.
“Talk to the hand” and “Bring it on” in Vietnam is often used for “bye bye”
“Not worthy” is used to mean “po’tay” which is a slang way of saying “You’re too much, I give up”
Hard to say whether these are due to cultural differences or in the case of talk to the hand and bring it on, ambiguous animations on our part.
Either way, it’s always interesting to see how our users put emoticons through their paces. To read Dong Ngo’s complete story, head over to CNET.com.
Are there emoticons you use in an unintended way? Let us know by leaving a comment here on the blog.
Sarah Bacon
Product Manager
