in my opinion it's annoying. they should't appear instead word - for example my name chris [c h r i s]is a name of pirate emoticon, etc.
i think it'd be better if the 'normal emots' like 😛, ;D etc. weren't change.
emoticons which replaces words, should be started and finished for example by < and > , or : ( like :chris:, or ) - they wouldn't be used by a mistake
Yeah i don't like emoticons so much... I mean those yellow faces ;D
Emoticons such as your name shall not have this kind of shortcuts, indeed. However changing the "regular" emoticons would lead to a lack of design, so you can either put a space between characters or go to your account settings and untick the apprioriate checkbox about smilies :]
i think penpal-gate should find some emoticons and design the place and there should be a place for private chat. you can't chat comfortably when all your messages are being read by other people and its very distracting when there are many people chating you can't concentrate on the one you are chating with. 🙂
There are already a lot of emoticons, and about the private chat you can send a message to a specific user (click his/her name, then click "send private message" or something like that)