It all started with this question:
How will birds cheeping sound
after they have inhaled Helium?
We needed a way to help people distinguish serious posts from jokes. Carnegie Mellon University computer scientist Scott Fahlman proposed a solution. It all started 26 years ago yesterday.
Here’s the original message board thread
And years later, Dave Barry updated the list.
http://www.randomhouse.com/features/davebarry/emoticon.html