New Emojis take on racial diversity
Those different characters on your emails and text messages are about to see more diversity — sending a message that humanity comes in many colors.
Unicode, the organization that develops emojis, said that a diverse range of skin tones will be available when Unicode Version 8.0 launches in June 2015.
“People all over the world want to have emoji that reflect more human diversity, especially for skin tone,” the organization’s report reads. “The Unicode emoji characters for people and body parts are meant to be generic, yet following the precedents set by the original Japanese carrier images, they are often shown with a light skin tone instead of a more generic (inhuman) appearance, such as a yellow/orange color or a silhouette.”
Emojis were developed in Japan in 1999 for mobile phones. In Japanese, emoji means picture-writing-character.
In a draft proposal of an update to the characters, the Unicode Consortium has laid out a possible method for making characters with a range of skin tones available to users.
“People all over the world want to have emoji that reflect more human diversity, especially for skin tone,” the draft says. This will include not only the existing yellow, but five other shades, ranging from pink and brown to black.
There are many symbols that may include anything from a green heart to a cute lollipop, but many are based on smiley faces.
Feedbacks to this report were mixed, some are just saying that it’s just a “waste of time”, some are questioning the purpose of bringing race into something meant purely to emote and others called the shades of emoji "a welcome addition, even if I'm 100% fine without them."
The planned release is for mid-2015, and the diversity proposals are still in draft stage.
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Unicode, the organization that develops emojis, said that a diverse range of skin tones will be available when Unicode Version 8.0 launches in June 2015.
“People all over the world want to have emoji that reflect more human diversity, especially for skin tone,” the organization’s report reads. “The Unicode emoji characters for people and body parts are meant to be generic, yet following the precedents set by the original Japanese carrier images, they are often shown with a light skin tone instead of a more generic (inhuman) appearance, such as a yellow/orange color or a silhouette.”
Emojis were developed in Japan in 1999 for mobile phones. In Japanese, emoji means picture-writing-character.
In a draft proposal of an update to the characters, the Unicode Consortium has laid out a possible method for making characters with a range of skin tones available to users.
“People all over the world want to have emoji that reflect more human diversity, especially for skin tone,” the draft says. This will include not only the existing yellow, but five other shades, ranging from pink and brown to black.
There are many symbols that may include anything from a green heart to a cute lollipop, but many are based on smiley faces.
Feedbacks to this report were mixed, some are just saying that it’s just a “waste of time”, some are questioning the purpose of bringing race into something meant purely to emote and others called the shades of emoji "a welcome addition, even if I'm 100% fine without them."
The planned release is for mid-2015, and the diversity proposals are still in draft stage.
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New Emojis take on racial diversity
Reviewed by TrendSpot
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Thursday, November 06, 2014
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Reviewed by TrendSpot
on
Thursday, November 06, 2014
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