Is this *sad*

elmyra wrote: »

I always thought a backslash indicated action, like above?

That's a forward slash, but anyway.

Otherwise, you are correct. As does the asterisk.

Many moons ago, before the advent of UBB code boards, most of us old-timers (i.e. mid 1990s) would conduct our social interactions using a system called IRC. Internet Relay Chat (There was also Usenet, but it wasn't as responsive sometimes). The manner in which an action was typed in was "/me does this" which would show up in the window as " *Username does this", the "*" indicating to the reader that it is a 3rd person action instead of a 'verbal' comment by Username.

The simplest and most common action to be carried out would be to slap someone, which would show up as " *Username slaps User2 around a bit with a large trout"

So here is your history lesson.

NTM