What does J mean at the end of emails?

Brynda · May 9, 2011, 5:47pm

I know a couple of people who do this, but I don’t know what it means. Neither of them are peeps I feel comfortable asking. Anyone know?

baileygrrrl · May 9, 2011, 5:51pm

I see this on emails from my husband in gmail - when I click “show details”, I see that it’s a smiley that he typed - like this -

Munch · May 9, 2011, 5:55pm

Their names aren’t by chance John or Joan or Jim, are they?

ReticulatingSplines · May 9, 2011, 5:56pm

Yeah, when the message is composed in Outlook and someone types a smiley, it is converted to the corresponding letter (“J”) in Wingdings font, so when the font information is lost or ignored in another email program, it shows up as a plain old J.

Brynda · May 9, 2011, 5:59pm

Ah! Mystery solved. Thanks much!

BetsQ · May 9, 2011, 7:37pm

OMG, I’ve been wondering this for so long! I’d figured out that it meant something akin to a smiley, but I couldn’t figure out what the relationship between the smiley and the letter J was! Thanks for explaining, ReticulatingSplines, and thanks for thinking to ask, Brynda!