Did you know that the 17th July is #WorldEmojiDay? Big news eh?! ?
Did you also know:
- Oxford Dictionaries named ? (Face with tears of joy) its 2015 ‘Word of the year’?
- Twitter has recently launched emoji keyword targeting for Twitter Ads?
- Over 110 billion emojis have been Tweeted since 2014?
- Sony Pictures Animation is developing an animated movie called ‘Emojimovie: Express Yourself’?
- Originally meaning pictograph, the word emoji comes from Japanese e (絵, “picture”) + moji (文字, “character”)? The apparent resemblance to the English words “emotion” and “emoticon” is just a coincidence.
The emoji, heralded as the first truly global language, originated, unsurprisingly, on Japanese mobile phones in the late 1990s. They have become increasingly popular worldwide since the rise of smartphones, and are now used everywhere; from text messages to Instagram hashtags.
But why? Well, you could say that a picture paints a thousand words, but we’ve heard that a million times already. And, it’s definitely not about being able to respond quickly – I don’t know about you, but I end up spending at least 2 or 3 minutes trying to select whether I want a smiling face with smiling eyes, a smiling face with open mouth, a smiling face with open mouth and smiling eyes, a grinning face, or a smiling face with open mouth and tightly-closed eyes…!
I personally think it’s about having a universal (and funny) language that our shared culture can understand.
Its many symbols are now being used to form entire sentences and stories. Whilst I don’t have time to tell you a story, I have created an emoji combinations quiz for you. Enjoy…