Not only is NYU research associate Fred Benenson planning to rewrite “Moby-Dick” entirely in emoticons, he’s also convinced 83 people to pay for it.

I’ll give you a moment to process this: Moby the longest book in the history of mankind Dick. In emoticons. And not just any emoticons, either. Benenson will be using Japanese Emoji symbols– the sort commonly available on Japanese phones– for the task. It gives the whole project a rather international edge, don’t you think?

While some might argue that this is the most pointless thing maybe ever, Benenson has already raised $3,676 of the $3,500 he needs for the project via Kickstarter (which is awesome, by the way). So either the economy truly is turning around and boredom spending is coming back into style, or more people than expected saw  the “Call me Ishmael” translation above and thought “brilliant, I must know more!”

Check out his “Emoji Dick” pitch here and let us know if you see the point in this deeply perplexing project. In his pitch, Benenson says he’s trying to “confront a lot of our shared anxieties about the future of human expression (see: Twitter or text messages) by forcing a great work of literature through such a strange new filter.” We’re leaning more towards publicity stunt or bored academic.

*Name updated from “Berenson” to the correct “Benenson” after we realized that the referenced CNET article misspelled it.