AutoSmiley uses the iSight to turn your face into an emoticon

This one's a little silly but I still really like it -- AutoSmiley is a public domain app that runs in the background while you work, quietly monitoring your iSight's camera input. Whenever it detects a smiling face on the camera (so any time you smile while working), it will send a ":)" emoticon to the keyboard. It's probably not quite practical, as there are a lot of times when you might smile but don't want to actually send an emoticon.

I do like the idea that it turns emoticons into real expressions of emotion. When you actually see a ":)" or an "lol" in someone's IM or email, you never really know if they've actually smiled or laughed at what you've typed earlier, and a program like this puts a little more power behind the colon and parenthesis. As the app's description says, using it can go a little farther towards "enforcing honesty in your online communication." The app is a free download for US, UK, and NL keyboards on the Mac.

The app was featured on Wednesday's TUAW TV Live, which you can watch to see AutoSmiley in action.