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17th Jul 2019
There’s an emoji for nearly anything. Dreaming of the pad thai leftovers in your fridge? The drooling emoji has you covered. Talking about Beyoncé? Use the bee emoji. Planning to storm into Area 51? The alien emoji is the way to go. Emojis are a versatile tool for communication; after all, a picture speaks a thousand words. With more than 1000 emojis available, there are a lot to choose from – and now, even more are coming.
In honour of World Emoji Day, which falls on July 17, our keyboards will be getting a serious upgrade: more than 59 new emojis are set to diversify our screens. Last year, Apple made a similar expansion, introducing more than 70 items, including a kangaroo and a mango.
Apple revealed their new range of designs this morning, and nearly every category, from smiley faces to clothes, have been updated. The food category will debut some new designs as well, such as waffles (Leslie Knope’s favourite), butter, garlic and falafels. A new yawning smiley face will be featured as well as a draped sari. The animal section of your keyboard will also see an update; last year peacocks and lobsters were welcomed in our hearts. This year, the new feathery and furry additions include a sloth hanging from a branch, a flamingo on one leg, a skunk and an orangutan.
The majority of the emoji updates have been designed to encourage more inclusion and diversity. According to Apple’s Newsroom, their proposal to the Unicode Consortium in 2018 has seen to the introduction of differently-abled emojis. A new guide dog, wheelchairs, an ear with a hearing aid, a prosthetic arm and a prosthetic leg are all being added to keyboards to promote diversity, one of Apple’s integral values. The holding hands emoji will also follow a similar update: now users can select any combination of skin tone and gender to personalise the people holding hands, with more than 75 possible combinations.
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Emojis are used to make up almost 50% of digital conversations and Australia, as one of the world’s highest emoji users, should be excited for the upcoming designs, especially as they celebrate more and more communities.
Oh, and the waffle one is great, too. It works well with that drooling emoji…