Have you ever wondered what the half moon chat symbol means on Facebook? The answers are forthcoming, in this Techspirited article.
Facebook is the online social networking site, that has changed the way we communicate. Once upon a time, we communicated with people, face-to-face. Today, we use Facebook to speak to our friends. The world has definitely become a smaller place with the advent of the Internet and social networking sites like Facebook. We can stay in contact with long-lost friends and people residing in other countries, cities, and sometimes even our next door neighbor (No, I am not exaggerating!). We use Facebook chat to have private conversations with friends and family. You may have observed a half moon symbol in the chat functionality. What does it indicate? Let us find out.
What the Icon Means
After you send a message on Facebook chat, you may not receive a reply. You may sit staring at your chat box, waiting for the person to reply. Slowly, the green dot, next to the person’s name, turns into a half moon.
Simple! It just means that the friend you are chatting with is currently ‘AFK’. Now, I am sure you are stumped. What does ‘AFK’ mean? This acronym stands for ‘Away from keyboard‘. Either your friend has logged into Facebook and gotten busy with another browser window over the Internet, or has moved away from the computer for some work. It may also mean that your friend fell asleep on the desk after partying hard last night.
Jokes apart, when a person does not work or carry out any activity on the Facebook chat application, for at least 10 minutes, his status is automatically changed to ‘idle’, symbolized by the half moon. When the person returns to chat, the half moon will get converted back to a green dot.
If you send out a message and do not receive a reply, just check if the half moon is displayed. This will help you know if the person is away, busy, or not present near the PC. Do not assume something is wrong with the Facebook chat, or the person is trying to avoid you. Half moon just means that the person has gone into an idle mode (not in a literal, but virtual sense).