The only appropriate response was a sentence that is never an appropriate response: "Uh, sorry, I didn't mean to throb at you."
That's a very specific kind of heart: the bend-me-over-the-kitchen-table kind. Hey, I'm not here to judge, but that is by no means a design fluke. Using Skype emojis is like animating the overly exaggerated emotions of a teenager who's trying to get high on black-market pregnancy hormones. You don't just smile -- you bear the smuggest, most shit-eatingest grin imaginable. You don't just frown -- you quiver, eyebrows drooping, blinking back tears of the forsaken.
Skype
It's like Pac-Man fucked Taylor Swift's "I just won an award" face and made every baby.
The result is that you convey emotions that you never intended. Let's say everyone is ganging up on you because they all have incorrect opinions about Harry Potter (totally hypothetically, of course -- we would never waste company time arguing about why Dobby had the saddest death when that's obviously true), and you choose to convey your sadness with a crying face. You're not really all that sad -- you just want them to know that they've made you cry and that your misery is all their fault. But Skype doesn't just display a crying face -- you get a wailing, screaming figure that's clearly on the brink of a full emotional collapse.
Skype
This is known as the "Zayn left One Direction" emoji.
Now they think they've really upset you. Then they're thinking, jeez, it's just a book. What's your fucking problem? Now there's a surreal rift between you, and it all could have been avoided if the Skype emojis could get a goddamn grip on themselves and display even the most remote form of subtlety. It's almost enough to make you yearn for the days of face-to-face communication, but let's be serious, not really. If I wanted that, I would have clicked the video button.