The SarcMark: Internet Necessity, or Redundant Waste of Money?

Sarcasm. In today's world of text messaging, e-mail, and other forms of textual communication, one's apparent use of sarcasm may be misinterpreted as a statement of seriousness. Even in spoken language, sarcasm can be misinterpreted. In the "Weird Al" Yankovic song "Albuquerque," the teller of the story gives this example of such a misinterpretation.

Okay, like one time, I was out in the parking lot trying to remove my excess ear wax with a golf pencil, when I see this guy Marty trying to carry a big ol' sofa up the stairs all by himself. So I say to him, I say, "Hey, you want me to help you with that?" And Marty, he just rolls his eyes and goes, "No, I want you to cut off my arms and legs off with a chainsaw!" So I did. And then he gets all indignant on me. He's like, “Hey man, I was just being sarcastic!" Well that's just great. How was I supposed to know that? I'm not a mind reader, for cryin' out loud. Besides, now he's got a really cute nickname: Torso Boy. So what's he complaining about?

Another example of misinterpreting sarcasm in one episode of The Big Bang Theory:

SHELDON: I have to say, I slept splendidly. Granted not long, just deeply and well.
LEONARD: I'm not surprised. a well-known cure for insomnia is to break into your neighbor's apartment and clean.
SHELDON: Sarcasm?
LEONARD: You think?
SHELDON: Granted, my methods may have been somewhat unorthodox, but I think the end result will be a measurable enhancement of Penny's quality of life.
LEONARD: You know what, you convinced me. Maybe tonight we should sneak in and shampoo her carpet.
SHELDON: You don't think that crosses the line?
LEONARD: Yes… For God's sake, Sheldon, do I have to hold up a sarcasm sign every time I open my mouth?
SHELDON: You have a sarcasm sign?
LEONARD: No, I do not have a sarcasm sign.
---
LEONARD: You are going to march yourself over there right now and apologize.
SHELDON: (laughs)
LEONARD: What's funny?
SHELDON: That wasn't sarcasm?
LEONARD: No!
SHELDON: Woo, boy! You are all over the place this morning.

("The Big Bran Hypothesis")

Later in the season, Leonard actually creates a sarcasm sign and holds it up for Sheldon to see. This was a one-time occurrence, though.

The need for a visual indication of the use of sarcasm is not new, but some have offered suggestions, with little apparent success.

Enter: the SarcMark.


As the video above indicates, the SarcMark consists of a circular spiral design ending with a dot in the interior of the spiral, similar to the "at" symbol, @. The associated Web site, offers a font and additional software (supposedly for keyboard mappings), for US$1.99. Is it really worth it, though? Here's why I think it isn't.

First off, the mark is mapped to Unicode code point U+E001, which is in a Private Use area, and is not part of the Unicode standard. Next, in order to see the SarcMark glyph, you need a special font which contains the mark at U+E001. This is sold through the Web site. If you want an intended recipient to see this mark, that recipient must also have the font and software installed, unless, of course, your message (or the mark itself) is converted into an image. Next on the SarcMark Problem List, there is no free alternative. Further complicating this issue is that the SarcMark is a trademarked design (USPTO, SN 77522403, RN 3712952, filed 2008-07-15, registered 2009-11-17), so even if there was a free version of this mark, it could be subject to litigation. Further, I do not believe that registered trademarks like this are even allowed in Unicode. Even if it were to be included in Unicode, it would need to be moved from its current U+E001 code point to somewhere else (Probably in the U+2E31 to U+2E7F range, extending Supplemental Punctuation), so documents using the U+E001 version of the mark would have to make edits to their documents. Finally, it is not supported across all systems. Their Supported Platforms page lists several applications in Windows, an apparently kludgy way of entering it on Mac, and several models of Blackberry. It's not like I can open Text Editor in Windows or TextEdit on Mac, press the shortcut key, and it appears. Linux, you ask? What's that؟ There is no official Linux support for this, so you Linux users are out of luck.

With so many shortcomings, I present this question: Why bother? Why would anyone pay money for something that is not universally supported, either in Unicode or systemwide applications, and of course, in Linux? It's basically as useful as those smileys that install spyware on your computer. I offer this alternative. Use characters that are already universally accessible and Unicode standardized.

In the late 19th century, French poet Alcanter de Brahm proposed using something he called a point d’ironie, or irony point. It is essentially a backward-facing question mark, which is to be used to indicate that the sentence should be understood at a second level (irony, sarcasm, etc.) It is found in Unicode at two different code points, U+061F and U+2E2E, the former being the Arabic question mark, and the latter being a simple reversed question mark. There's already one irony mark in this blog post. (Linux, you ask? What's that؟) There's a bit of a problem using the Arabic question mark though. The English language is written from left to right (LTR). Arabic is written from right to left (RTL). This directional paradox is found in many text entry applications, from Web browsers to word processors. When typing using a primarily LTR script (like English), then all of a sudden, a character from a RTL script is inserted (like that Arabic question mark), the software automatically thinks, "Okay, the user has inserted a RTL character. Put the insertion point to the character's left." This can be confusing for writers new to the concept of switching back and forth between LTR and RTL. The solution would be to use the U+2E2E reversed question mark. The problem with this is that while Unicode is supported on Windows, Mac, and Linux, not all fonts have a glyph mapped to this code point. This is why you're seeing Arabic question marks instead of reversed question marks: ⸮.

This leads us to a second alternative, which can be used even on cell phones with international keyboard input. Of course, I'm referring to the inverted exclamation point (¡). Look at the above dialogue from The Big Bang Theory again with this punctuation.

SHELDON: I have to say, I slept splendidly. Granted not long, just deeply and well.
LEONARD: I'm not surprised. a well-known cure for insomnia is to break into your neighbor's apartment and clean¡
SHELDON: Sarcasm?
LEONARD: You think?
SHELDON: Granted, my methods may have been somewhat unorthodox, but I think the end result will be a measurable enhancement of Penny's quality of life.
LEONARD: You know what, you convinced me. Maybe tonight we should sneak in and shampoo her carpet¡
SHELDON: You don't think that crosses the line?
LEONARD: Yes… For God's sake, Sheldon, do I have to hold up a sarcasm sign every time I open my mouth?
SHELDON: You have a sarcasm sign?
LEONARD: No, I do not have a sarcasm sign.
---
LEONARD: You are going to march yourself over there right now and apologize.
SHELDON: (laughs)
LEONARD: What's funny?
SHELDON: That wasn't sarcasm?
LEONARD: No!
SHELDON: Woo, boy! You are all over the place this morning.

You can easily see where Leonard is being sarcastic (even though Sheldon can't) with the inverted exclamation point placed at the end of those sentences.

Entering the inverted exclamation point is relatively simple. For Windows, it’s ALT+0161. In Mac, it’s Option+1. Much simpler (and less expensive) than buying and downloading a font. But what about sarcastic statements which are questions? Use the irony point. Since it looks like a question mark, there should at least be some kind of question associated with it.

In short, I suggest that to show sarcasm in written text, instead of buying and downloading a font with limited use and limited compatibility, use the following:
• The irony point (؟ or ⸮) when the sarcastic statement is a question
• The inverted exclamation point (¡) otherwise.

NOTE: This writing is not intended as sarcasm. If it were, every sentence of it would have ended with ¡ or ⸮.

OOPS! is brought to you by erasers. Don't make a mistake without one.

A couple of weeks ago, signs like this one appeared in dining halls across the Queens College campus:


At the time, the price of a bottle of soda was $1.50. Note the amount of the increase stated on the sign, as quoted above: 0.7¢. As is (hopefully) still taught in homes and elementary schools across the country, one cent, which can be written in figures as 1¢ or $0.01, is a hundredth part (1/100) of one dollar. Also (hopefully) taught in elementary schools is the concept of real values between zero and one – “Fractions.” Young students also (hopefully) learn about a concept called “place value,” which essentially means that for each digit to the left or right of the decimal point, the digit’s value increases or decreases by a factor of 10. Therefore that 0.7¢ increase reported on these signs means that the increase is less than one cent (7×10^-1 < 0×10⁰). If anyone remembers that sketch from Square One TV, that dealt with the different ways of expressing fractions (which first aired in 1987), 0.7 could also be written as 70% and 7/10. (I should note that they write and say the decimal form of the fraction without the leading zero, but its value is the same.) If you don’t, I miraculously found it on YouTube. Watch and learn.



Why am I going on and on about the value of “zero point 7 cents”? Well, when I first saw this sign, I thought that it was interesting that they would increase the price by seven-tenths of a cent, bringing the price to $1.507 (or more sensibly, rounding up to the nearest cent, $1.51). On November 30th, they increased the price, but instead of seven-tenths of a cent, the price increased by seven cents! The amount of the increase was ten times the amount reported on the signs!

This is just a part of a disturbing trend that I’ve seen across the region, where people seem to be forgetting about place value, and how it relates to dollars and cents. If I were to go to a store which displays a sign advertising copies at a price of “.10¢” I would easily expect to walk in, make ten copies of something, and pay exactly one cent, because the sign advertises copies at one-tenth of a cent. However, if I am asked to pay a dollar, I would protest, saying that the sign says “.10¢,” and that “.10¢” is less than one cent, and 10×.10¢ is 1.00¢.

My point: If you’re going to raise the price of something by seven cents, just say that you’re raising the price by seven cents, not a fraction of a cent. Besides, I don’t think I have enough coupons with statements of cash value being a fraction of a cent to make seven-tenths of a cent!

McDonald's: Overpriced?

So I went over to McDonald's this morning to get some breakfast. I order the Deluxe Breakfast Platter with orange juice. THEY WANTED EIGHT DOLLARS FOR IT! Now, I've paid more for a meal before, but that was because the quality of the food warranted it. The quality of McDonald's food does NOT warrant paying eight dollars for two pancakes, scrambled eggs, three pieces of bacon and a hash brown. Six dollars, maybe, but NOT eight. It's drive-thru robbery! It's price gouging! It's an outrage! I'm not going back to McDonald's for breakfast anytime soon.