all right hi everyone welcome and thank
you for coming I'm pleased today to
introduce Jenny Lee who is a vice chair
of the unicode emoji subcommittee
graduated from the college herself and
is back in Cambridge today to talk with
us all about emoji so please join me in
welcoming Jenny Lee thank you here is
good so a fun fact professor in Mahlon
and I actually were in the same class at
Harvard and I actually took cs50 as a
freshman because I was an applied math
and economics major but at that point is
it was not like the lifestyle brand that
has since become so I definitely
appreciate like all the bells and
whistles and the fact that we now get
free pizza and like lots of live
streaming so David I guess saw I guess
maybe you saw Jimmy Kimmel appearance I
I had on emoji and asked me to come
speak so I'm gonna give you sort of a
fun overview of like how does an emoji
become an emoji so I'm going to start
the story with my friend whose name is
Ian Liu who is a designer very well
known for having designed a twitter fail
well and she's Chinese Australia and I'm
chinese-american and we were you know
texting about dumplings cuz that is what
Chinese ish women do with each other and
so I had texted her
you know this photo dumplings that I was
cooking and she was like yum-yum yum-yum
fried dumplings you know yay
knife and fork knife and fork and then
then she's like I'm surprised an apple
doesn't have a dumpling emoji and I was
like oh ha good point and then like you
know that would probably been the end of
anything cuz you know many conversations
just sort of end on there like surprised
that something doesn't exist but half an
hour later on my screen pops like this
dumpling with blinking eyes so you don't
actually get the full effect of like the
bling-bling dumpling that she had
created and she had decided to design
her own dumpling emoji because she was
designer and she's like I can fix this
man I was really kind of startled when I
discovered there was no dumpling emoji
right cuz like I knew that emoji
originally Japanese and that's why there
are a lot of Japanese foods on the
keyboard right so you know there's
there's the bento box there's curry
there's some pora they're like kind of a
bunch of weird Japanese food it's like I
think these are like fit I've seen this
on the streets of Japan I think they're
like fishy things on a stick this is a
fish cake yeah what does it call old Dan
yeah they have and it's their fishy
things right on a stick basically I mean
and there's even like the whole like
rice ball that looks like it's had a
bikini wax and so but there was no
dumpling emoji which I thought was very
strange because like if you think about
it dumplings are universal food like
every country has their version of a
dumpling like it's you know empanada or
pierogi or you know pal meanie or like
even ravioli is a form dumpling like
essentially like there's this universal
truth of yummy goodness inside a carboy
carbohydrate shell that basically every
culture is discovered um so I was like
okay dumplings are universal and of
course emoji are universal and the fact
that therefore there wasn't a dumpling
emoji told me whatever system in place
was like basically broken so I was like
I'm gonna go fix this I had like no idea
where emoji came from but I was like a
woman on a mission to find herself her
dumpling emoji so I was like who
controls emoji knew nothing about it but
you know yeah Google and to be very
quickly you get to the website and I did
of the Unicode consortium which is a
nonprofit organization based in Mountain
View California who has at that point I
discovered 12 full voting members nine
of which were us multinational tech
companies so this was in late 2005 when
I started going down a rabbit hole so
these companies the nine were things
like Oracle and IBM and Microsoft Adobe
Google Apple Facebook and Yahoo of the
three that were not us multinational
tech companies they were a German
company s ap the Chinese company Huawei
which no one had heard of back then but
not like a lot of people have heard of
now and then the government of Oman
right so these were these were the
twelve full voting members who paid
eighteen thousand dollars a year to vote
on emoji and I was like kind of
horrified by this like the sort of like
you know tech
Plus Oman so so I was like very
indignant first of all and I also
discover like $18,000 times like 12 did
we wouldn't take that much money to take
her that concerns him
but luckily ders is like this tiny
little loophole which is that you can
join as an individual for $75 no moaning
power but you get to show up at the
meetings and you get added to their
mailing list so you know I'm like okay
you know like I like you know paid my
$75 online using a credit card and like
became a Unicode member like join the
you know email and I was like okay I'm
on a mission and and so they had they
had these meetings and so you know
you're on email list and they send out
this RSVP request and said who's gonna
come to the next meeting
you know I was like in October I think
or November I looked at my calendar and
I was like I will be in a Bay Area at
that time and I like RSVP back I'm like
I will come and I don't completely know
what I was expecting so essentially I
maybe like a little Congress like a very
mini Congress or something but I took my
you know I got on the public transit and
it went to the Apple headquarters this
is in Sunnyvale and you know I don't
know maybe I thought was like there
would be like a hundred people maybe
like the number of people in this room
but sort of like more neatly organized
and sort of a you know a Nancy Pelosi
kind of style like Ark but it's not what
I found this is the room where people
decide these are the people who decide
your emoji these were this is a photo
from the November 2015 and it was really
weird because first of all they were
super excited to see me because they
have most of these people have been
working together for like 25 years and
like new people don't just like randomly
show up and they're like you know tell
us about yourself what brings you here
we're so happy to see you and it totally
had the vibe of like a new church like
really really really nice old white
people and so the the sort of group you
know they were basically mostly male
mostly engineers mostly older and you
know one of them even had a daughter
that had made him a shirt I said shadowy
emoji overlord this is the chair of the
unicode emoji subcommittee and the
president of Unicode
davus so they just sort of were debating
about emoji you know things like milk
should it be a glass of milk should it
be a bottle of milk should it be a
carton of milk is cartons aren't
universal you know then there was like
so you know kind of big debate about
milk and then there was like this
question about beans red beans green
beans black beans like which beans
should we choose and there was like
parallel paralysis over the color of
being so there's no being emoji if you
haven't noticed there is a glass of milk
emoji and I was like this system is like
clearly broken and like I'm gonna go fix
it so um I created a group it's called a
mochi nation whose motto is emoji by the
people for the people so it was me and
you know my friend iing from way back
when and and then you know our include
you know our motto is more inclusive and
representative emoji and you're starting
with a dumpling which was our mission to
begin with so you know started this
campaign we're gonna get the dumpling
emoji and made a kickstarter video and
the dumpling emoji project I think
dumpling emoji that work is still alive
and I think okay does the video work and
we made this video dumplings are one of
the most universal cross-cultural foods
in the world Georgia has khinkali
Japan s Kyodo Korea has mandu Italy has
ravioli Poland has pierogi Russia has
pelmeni Argentina has empanadas Jewish
people have crapola China has
potstickers Nepal and Tibet have Momo's
yet somehow despite the popularity there
is no dumpling emoji in the standard set
why is that emoji exists for pizza
tempura sushi spaghetti hotdog and
articles which Taco Bell takes credit
for we need to write this disparity
dumplings are global emoji available
isn't it time we brought them together
oh yeah oh well write it how about an
emoji for Chinese takeout so yeah you
know kind of phrase like I think we
raise like $12,000
so did we could join the Unicode
consortium and so imagination became a
member and you know wrote I wrote my
little emoji proposal with a you know a
bunch of us all kind of dumpling lovers
together and we we got it passed in
January 2016 so this is Yin with you
know I'm mysterious this was then the
other co-chair of the emoji subcommittee
from Apple who like who they roll
anonymously in Apple but there he is
and so these are our original set so
along with dumpling we did takeout box
and chopsticks and then fortune cookie
and to be honest I don't think fortune
cookie would have like gotten in on its
own merits but on the sort of coattails
of dumpling and takeout box and
chopsticks they kind of made it and so
it took a couple you know a while these
are the ones now an Apple like very
photorealistic like like dumpling I have
to say like totally weird like dead
pac-man interpretation of the fortune 50
on the hospital by like first of all
there's like no mouth and no thing it's
like totally like some kind of dead
three-dimensional pac-man so you know it
kind of got me into this like deep deep
deep rabbit hole of like well how does
an emoji become an emoji and it is
actually like a really weird process so
you know first of all let's say you have
an idea and this is what's really nice
anyone can submit an emoji rehearsal so
you have your idea and then you write a
proposal and you submit it to the emoji
subcommittee which kind of talks about
it and sometimes they'll kick it back to
you and you kind of go around and around
the circle you know they'll have
feedback they don't like your design
they don't think your statistics are
good it's like very these meetings are
really funny because they're kind of
like c-span but like around emoji and
the emoji subcommittee then you know at
a certain point when it's good it'll
kick it to the full committee so factors
for inclusion like what kinds of things
does the committee care about so things
you know if it's popular demand
frequently requested
which they interestingly enough kind of
use like how many times the term appears
on like Google search or YouTube or for
a while there was Instagram hashtags as
a way of like measuring demand and this
is also just like the general disease of
like engineers which does they love to
measure things and and they and if it
can't be measured they sometimes can't
value it and which is kind of
interesting right because they always
want to try to map like the world into
like metrics and we you know one can
have these very extensive the bates of
whether or not you know demand to be
measured through like whether or not the
term appears in google or in youtube but
the kind of pluses from multiple uses
äj-- and meetings so like fox like in
can mean both fox and you know like a
kind of like wily or sly or an owl can
mean like can mean why is where a skunk
can mean smelly and then one of the
necessary things it has to be able to
like kind of appear distinct at little
emoji sizes and then there is sort of
sometimes a value in terms of like
filling a gap or completeness so for a
while there the only we had hearts were
red yellow green blue purple white maybe
maybe white black but we didn't have
orange so then we you know orange really
kind of like Ornt the orange heart
actually kind of slid in there basically
because like all the other hearts were
there but like bizarrely orange heart
was missing factors against emoji
inclusion are basically two specific to
narrow so like a very specific kind of
dog as business dogs in general
redundant so a good example there was we
had a proposal like one of the turkey
companies they wanted a roast turkey but
we already had a live turkey so we
decided like both of them basically can
mean thanksgiving so like you don't need
two forms of turkey cooked and not cook
that we do have two forms of chicken
cooked and not cooked we have all
actually the whole lifecycle of a
chicken I don't know if you've ever
noticed we have like the egg the egg in
like a little like you know she'll I'm
sorry eggs and the chick in a shell
chick by itself full chicken then cooked
chicken and then if you really want to
complete we also poo at the s my link
food at the end and
this is key actually no logos brands
daddies and celebrities so this really
confuses people they're like why can't
we get the cocaine or why can't we get
like the Nike swoosh and basically
because you can't there's all kinds of
IP issues so no daddies either certain
we're like no Buddha no Mohammed no no
no deities of no cash you know and when
you hear about like Kim oh geez
like those are not really mochi there's
essentially stickers but so that's
really key like these once an emoji
always an emoji they kind of look for
longevity and so once it kind of gets
out of the subcommittee it gets skid
kicked to the full committee the full
Unicode Technical Committee those are
the people that were in the room and
then three times sorry four times a year
they meet and then each one of those
they kind of you know vote to pass a set
of emoji for like provisional or
basically candidate their candidates at
that point and so you know four times a
year they kind of like vote on ones that
will become candidates and then once a
year as a whole batch they vote and
those get selected for the next year so
it takes actually a pretty long time and
though so once here they lock the emoji
and once it's locked it goes through all
the different like you know vendors like
Google and Apple and they have to start
basically adding it into just you know
all the software all designs lots of
things happen very they keep on telling
us it's very very expensive to get these
emoji paths so these are all compute
like companies with like billions of
dollars on their on their sort of books
so I don't I'm not super sympathetic
when they're like you know five more
emoji is like overwhelming for their
folks so then those kind of then show up
on your phone and laptops for Apple most
of the updates happen in November like
late October November I think we just if
you guys have updated your iOS devices
because they're like apples very
persistent in like making you eat your
device you have seen the latest
generation for the 2019 emoji so that is
how it becomes an emoji it takes about
18 to 24 months so when I first proposed
my dumpling emoji it was like
like my first got my idea in September
like September of 2015 I proposed it in
January of 2016 and it hit the phone in
November ish October ish of 2017 so very
very long time very very long time so
you know emoji nation like you know it
was kind of a tongue-in-cheek thing you
know just like the whole video thing but
we we kind of like went on a little
crusade to help kind of pass a bunch of
inclusive and representative emoji so we
like to think of ourselves as the voice
the people in the room that matters so
so one of the interesting things is like
why does Unicode there's like you know
consortium cabal thing control emojis a
part of it is sort of a natural accident
of just what Unicode does to give you
some history
yeah there's sort of debates about when
emoji started essentially a certain
Japan sometime in the late 1990s there's
a Softbank collection DoCoMo collection
this one is sort of the famed kind of
like oh it's all in color and was
introduced in 1999 probably created I
think in 97 and super so famous that
they are they were collected this is
very funny as in the Museum of Modern
Art collected the emoji as part of their
permanent collection which is of course
very strange if you think about it
because they're they're just images so
there's nothing - there's nothing to
collect or told but from a museum
perspective it actually a lot of
collecting of digital property has a lot
to do with IP rights and be able to
repay and create them you know and all
kinds of stuff so what happened then was
in about 2007 so emoji were incredibly
popular in Japan and at a certain point
you know all the phones and all you know
across all the different carriers had
their own little versions of emoji and
then what happened was shemales landed
basically in Japan and people would
wouldn't you know send their emoji using
Gmail on their phones but of course
Gmail couldn't capture the emojis
because these are just proprietary
systems so you would like have this kind
of weird situation where like these
these symbols would get lost as you kind
of moved between you know
email and the phones and then of course
in all the phones have their different
versions and so essentially Google and
some others kind of went to Unicode and
said can you please help us kind of
coordinate this because essentially what
is Unicode its mission the sometimes
gets lost and all the late night you
know television shows but Unicode has a
very interesting Commission it's to
enable everyone speaking every language
on the earth to be able to use their
language on their computer or smart
smartphones and they you know basically
see it as a form of human right because
if you cannot communicate with your
language in the digital era and
essentially will become extinct so it's
kind of interesting because I you know
they started with you know back and way
back when with like encoding like
Russian and Arabic and you know the
second generation was like Chinese or a
little bit Chinese Japanese and Korean
we're a little harder and then he kind
of like worked on their way down you got
to like hieroglyphics now they're
they're basically at a lot of minority
languages and sometimes like dead
languages right now so they have three
main projects this is kind of key I know
that everyone pays attention in moji
that's kind of what I kind of came down
the rabbit hole with so they encode
characters including emoji now they're
over a hundred thousand characters
encoded that's like whatever one is news
and four but from a practical
perspective if you are computer science
person they actually have to other
things are very important today of
localization resources which is known as
the common look how data repository also
known as cldr so that tells you like you
know that's a month in this country does
the date format work you know month
month year month one date no mmddyy or
is it like you know DD M my you know
Oreos are the 24 hour clock or Zaffino
so all kinds of locality information
gets stored in these sort of localized
resources including all the various
names for the emoji in the various
different languages they also have
programming languages programming
libraries to do all of this stuff and
that's called the international
components for Unicode or ICU and so
what's really funny is cldr is the name
this is what they call most people
actually don't even I I had to Google to
figure out what the whole name is
because we just call it cldr and so very
funny I guess like some
[Music]
his girlfriend or something misheard
cldr and so she was like what's a seal
dear and so she made him a little seal
dear for when I was this is like very
operated on this poor stuffed animal had
all kinds of surgery that are like it's
like really trouble problematic so he
you know she made him a little seal dear
and this has become sort of an
unofficial mascot of like that part of
Unicode so it's you know they introduced
so they started the proposal in 2007 it
actually took into 2010 to introduce the
first generation emoji unicode 6.0 they
just like had a bunch of emoji including
you know one of our lovely I think poo
emoji smiling poo emoji is among is
among the so they basically took all of
the you know different versions of the
emoji from the different carriers and
basically try to reconcile them not of
all of which were got completely
reconcilable but like whatever so like
one of the weird examples is you know
one Japanese carrier had like women with
bunny ears as like a portrait shot so
just one woman and I was sort of I think
on the Android side then separately on
whoever Apple was working with had like
two women in bunny bunny ears like total
full-body so like clearly bunny ears are
important in Japan but those those got
matched to each other even though they
were obviously very different once you
send them back and forth but whatever so
these were the original ones and what is
account is encoding work so basically
for those of you who may remember one of
the first lectures I don't David sent me
his lecture notes but you know basically
a Unicode code point is a unique number
assigned to each unicode character so
each character gets one little piece of
Unicode real estate you know this face
with tear of joy and with tears tears of
joy this is its little you know code
like code point if you and you know
hexadecimal if you translate the
hexadecimal ends up being this number
and we translate into binary it looks
like that number so these are all the
same as they kind of like move through
whatever like parser is interpreting
howl emoji so you know they kind of land
in 2010 and I don't know if we talked to
the original emoji proposers they don't
necessarily think anything big was gonna
happen cuz they encode kind of like
characters all the time right like
little you know like poker like for when
you play cards and when you play chess
they and wingding so it wasn't like that
big a deal to just add this sort of set
of images into the Unicode library but
then Apple decided to kind of basically
put a keyboard the emoji keyboard onto
our phones and then suddenly you can see
you kind of basically see where like
emoji was kind of hanging out and then
iOS decided to add you know the key or
make the keyboard more accessible with
emoji and then and there goes that is
rising popularity of emoji all the time
so again anyone can submit to to Unicode
document at Unicode org my friend kind
of oversees that it's a very funny
account to get things at so you know
kind of proposals we've helped pass this
is where youth album ad who is who is a
15 year old girl when she decided she
wanted a hijab emoji and so she wrote in
and we hoped she actually got into
hardware but you stamp Stanford but we
will forgive her for that so she's now
at Stanford and as I say like you can
come to the Unicode meetings now I'm on
the ones that happened on a quarterly
basis so that was her original proposal
when it first came over and I was
through course ID and then there was I
have a group of friends in Argentina who
really were went all out for the Motta
emoji which actually just showed up I
think I should have showed up on your
phones this yeah I mean they were this
was like national news like the largest
or not the largest but like the most
prestigious paper la nación in Buenos
Aires in Argentina had a full-page
Sunday article about their like campaign
for they mafia emoji very weirdly we
also had this group mister about girls
advocacy group that wanted a
menstruation emoji which I get I get but
of course they like proposed bloody
underwear which is like a terrible emoji
for all kinds of reasons
so I was like uh-uh and so we convinced
them to do blood drop so that you know
menstruation you can moon
and blood drop Calendar and a blood drop
we even got them sort of briefs and a
blood drop so you know like I said who
can provide some OG all thank the people
so skin tones you know there's a lot
wonderful skin tones that you see that
kind of changed emoji everywhere those
were actually proposed by a mom out of
Texas named Katrina parrot just a mom
like her daughter came home one day and
was like you know I'd really like to see
myself represented in emoji and then her
mom was like that's great honey
what's an emoji you know and when she
found out she works in procurement so I
think she worked for NASA and and so
like she can handle paperwork like she
can handle bureaucracies so a lot of
that goes to your credit a woman named
Katrina Perrin like this is not like you
know the white men and the white nerdy
men in the room in in a mountain view or
Sunnyvale coming up with skin tones so
women's flat shoe if you guys have have
seen this but ballet flat that was sort
of a reaction by from a mom of four Oh
actually wait let's see she the the
person who also worked on that also got
one-piece bathing suit because she's
really bothered by the fact the only
form of skin where was you know itsy
bitsy teeny polka dot yellow polka dot
bikini um like obviously like weirdly
overtly sexualized and so it was
actually done by a mom of like three now
for girls so when I met her she had
three now she has four when she had
spent many many years pregnant and
breastfeeding and was like not wearing
heels and so up until that point all the
heels on the keyboard started all the
shoes women's shoes all had heels right
samos had heels said heels everything in
heels so letõs had heels so that is now
we can we have her I think she got a lot
of press out of in part cuz she is a PR
person and just like random evil there's
like this German who wanted like you
know what we call the Khobar emoji like
you know
so he like wrote it in I know I'm late
ech and like it got passed then
governments we had to actually literally
the finished equivalent of the State
Department proposed asada emoji which is
like terrible like first of all these
these are very very sad naked people
with club so is from yes it was the
ministry for Foreign Affairs so they
they proposed this we kind of help shape
it into like maybe a little bit like
more clear and was you know the women's
with the spoon and then wearing a towel
a little bit more modest but like
variables early in a translation of like
telephone which is emoji it just
basically became person in a steamy room
so I don't have you seen these it's like
person coming out of a shower
essentially that was originally so this
is the morphing that a that happened in
the sort of whole Unicode proposal games
so you know one you know why do I care
about emoji so one of the reasons I grew
up speaking Chinese and that gives you a
very interesting perspective on emoji
right because you know if you think
about it like in some ways Chinese are
the original form of emoji along with
hieroglyphics you know and these are
these are actually you know fire fight
this is like fire way back when that's a
modern fire character and then of course
the fire emoji
this is mouth you know if there's you
know looks very mouth like there's tree
or wood and then moon and then Sun right
these are all you can kind of see this
universality of objects that have been
depicted both you know you know whether
or not in a Shang Dynasty or now in form
of like colorful little glyphs on your
iPhone and what's kind of really fun
about like Chinese characters you can
like start mixing and matching all the
little things so for example you have
two trees you basically have a forest
oops
you know if you take mean this character
this is basically you take a Sun and a
moon together and it basically means
bright but do you get more fun like so
here is any kind of like can see the
psychology of a culture
so this is basically a roof with a pig
so that lower creature is a pig it's a
roof so you're like oh maybe it's like a
farm maybe you know or like a parn but
no this actually means job means home
this is or family so basically home is
where your pigs are which I think says a
lot about China at that time so another
fun one Oh super fun so this character
radical means woman or girl and you
could you know maybe it's like like
she's like curtseying or like whatever
so I'll use all kinds of ways in Chinese
characters so this is my favorite one
again we have the roof we have the woman
so you're like Oh roof and women like
maybe means home or means family right
like you know but actually no it
actually means peace so i'm means peace
so like things are at peace when the
woman is under a roof at home or
whatever so you know very similarly you
have the woman you have a kid or boy
depending baby boy if you put all of
those together you're like oh maybe not
also means family but no it means good
so our standard for good is a woman with
a baby boy so that all kinds of like
issues about that and you all kinds of
combinations as radical shows up in
Chinese so what are three women together
means evil or wicked so very like
Macbeth II like whatever I know this
character means greedy this character
means slave this character means jealous
this character means like to betray or
adultery I mean very loosely interpreted
me adultery so you're like oh you know
like and growing up as like you know
your little six year old learning your
characters not like the adultery
character at that point but you know
you're like this is you know kind of
subliminally kind of sending all kinds
of messages to my little like you know
developing brain but they're all there
were also all kinds of issues with emoji
in that way right so until 2016 there
are many ways you could be a man in a
job on your MIDI keyboard you can be
police man you could be a detective you
could be a buckingham palace guard you
can be Santa Claus you can be Santa
Claus all kinds of colors so you be
Santa Claus
until 2015 or 2016
there were only four things you could be
as a woman the emoji keyboard so they
were Princess Bride dancer and Playboy
bunny
so those work those are our jobs right
so like clearly like all kinds of issues
all you know Japan like whatever this is
like so problematic and so what's
interesting is we can now talk about the
power of combining emoji so it turns out
a lot of the emoji on your keyboard
actually aren't assigned code points
they're actually like a bunch of emoji
kind of squished together so skin tones
are one of those examples like sometimes
have you send something to an old like
someone with an old phone or sometimes
like Gmail you'll see like emoji start
breaking apart so you'll get so
essentially there are their skin tones
but they're usually the yellow person
with like a little square after it based
on the fitzpatricks scale of skin tones
which kind of has to do with skin cancer
very oddly but we also have this idea
was wij which stands for zero with
Joyner very interestingly kind of mostly
used in in like languages like Arabic
where you want to kind of glue
characters together sometimes you'll see
them in English where you have like an F
in it L and they're kind of glued into a
very nice like ligature that kind of
invisible FL ness is often sometimes
this zero with Joyner
so we glue things all together you put
rainbow and a flag and you get a rainbow
flag actually this actually I think the
other way around it's a flag than a
rainbow yet rainbow flag um and actually
a lot of the women the point you're like
worked really hard Google gets a lot of
credit for this these occupations are
oftentimes almost always actually a
female character or male character plus
something after it so the astronaut is a
woman plus the spaceship you know and
then the the doctor sure not the doctor
the chef is like a woman plus like I
think the front I think is a frying egg
so those are creations of these like
edgy the genus you know farmer food
servers education all these I like the
ones with a laptop that ones like really
I have a lot of people who use that in
their like Twitter handle or Instagram
handle um
the other really interesting thing I'm
very proud of this is if you guys have
updated your phones and you have iPhones
you'll notice suddenly you can have like
interracial or multiracial people
holding hands at this point
and those are also is would you care
baby there's a lot of characters going
on like when you're creating creating
the people holding hands wait let's get
this so we actually had worked with
tinder
yes tinder to do a proposal on
interracial couple emoji which was super
fun and they care in part because I
think studies have shown that and it's
like real study he's like academic
studies not just like you know Marconi
study is that as online dating appears
in a community the rates of interracial
marriage go up so they're like they're
like oh cool and so now I think it's
very cute it's a new interface we were
very interested to see there were like a
combinatoric explosion of all of these
creatures is like very very high so so I
was I was really excited to see how they
did that Mike didn't add oh no okay
there was a full-page ad in The New York
Times somewhere but I must have like cut
that out in my slides oh well
so for mojo nation here's a sample of
some of the emoji we've done this
doesn't include the most recent ones
because I've not updated my Mac OS so
some of the ones that you've seen like
the math day emoji and the blood drop or
not on here but gives you a sense of
like the fun that we had we did a whole
bunch with GE the science emoji like DNA
and new petri dish and microbe I'm very
proud of like the toilet paper emoji my
friend super excited about that lobster
we got the we actually ate a very strong
supportive letter from senator angus
King on behalf of the lobster especially
given the other crew station kind of
representation that was already on a
keyboard through crabs and shrimp that
lobster also needed to be representative
bagel that was like my way was saying
like Jewish without like the Star of
David on behalf of my Jewish friends and
these are some of the people who have
contributed who just very different than
the room that you saw in the beginning
so it's super fun you can join us on our
slack and
and you know just sort of some
interesting stats with this month maybe
last month last month unicode actually
released for the first time the
frequency of use so this is it's really
funny it's kind of interesting so it's
like it's like tiered and it's in log
two which I thought was very unicode so
so in theory like the you know the ones
in one are used half as much as the ones
in level zero and then two half as much
as a ones in level one don't do that all
the way down and so one of the most
fascinating things I do not know how
this is possible but essentially face
this with tears of joy by itself is like
10% of all emoji usage according so you
can see it goes from Facebook to your
joy then the heart is really big then
hard eyes then laughing so and then the
hands and then it just kind of goes all
the way down it's really fun it's
definitely worth kind of looking because
it it makes you like wonder a little bit
about like like who and why are people
using all these emoji so there's a sort
of question like what is the future of
emoji unicode doesn't want to be he in
the world of regulating emoji it's like
not really what it's designed to be
doing um so I have a friend who was a
professor at Stanford who is pushing you
know he thinks is a terrible idea for
Unicode to be regulating he and he had
me you know because I always like you
know singing my name in latex
dinner propose something back in 2016
which is the idea that maybe the
encoding should not be kind of managed
by central regulatory body but instead
you know you free the little images you
do a hash and then you know standard
hash and then the you know check that
generates a sequence of numbers and then
you look at those that sequence of
numbers and you pass that back and forth
of course then you need a central
repository what those numbers are yeah
or whatever so then there's another one
that we just introduced this year mark
did this which is very interesting
actually I don't know if this will fly I
do find it very interesting it's
basically using what are known as cue ID
numbers which I do not know were the
numbering system that's used in
Wikipedia
so everything in Wikipedia apparently
has is like numbered and they has a cue
ID number and what that does is it kind
of unites things like
there's one Barack Obama page right but
sorry there's one Barack Obama qid but
he has pages in like Spanish and Russian
and Chinese an Indonesian and whatever
so so it kind of all reconciles it's
very funny because I think like one is
like the universe and like two is earth
like they they're very very methodical
and in like their sense of humor in
terms of numbering things so one thing
would be Chi can we use these Q ID
numbers that are in the Wikipedia
numbering system as a way of sort of
flexibly but standardized way of like
encoding things back for I don't know I
hear I think our friends our Facebook or
sort of like or whatsapp folks are kind
of like not into this idea but I think
is really interesting and then you know
what emoji are we working on if you have
questions all I'll tell you and then
that's me so you can reach me at like
Jenny an emoji condo or Jenny an emoji
nation not org those are the same that
yeah and I'm how am I in time I'm good
tada
and if you really want it we want to
play we can also play emoji Spelling Bee
later which is sort of my my way I just
did a hope to my first emoji spelling
bee in Hong Kong which is super fun I
can teach you guys how to play so QQ a
yes no done yay yeah I don't know I
don't like people so are there questions
we could play emoji spelling me if not
yes
yeah okay so the question is like how do
the vendors or the different platforms
do they're staying independently of like
what Unicode tells them to do so Unicode
is so when Unicode encodes like bagel
emoji its equivalent of encoding like a
capital letter B right so it does not
actually say what the B should look like
it gives a guidance image but then like
the platforms weren't off and do like
kind of whatever they want to do and
sometimes that causes all kinds of
issues cuz like sometimes it's facing
left sometimes it's facing right
sometimes it's an animal's head
sometimes is the animal's body and so
that has caused much annoyance
everywhere and so there is sort of an
effort to coordinate behind this the
designers have their own little mailing
list so that they can coordinate and at
least have some consistency say this was
an issue most recently with Razer was
the thing that was passed and Adam it
original image was a straight-edged
razor razor which I was like and it's
like not super gender-inclusive so we we
were pushing them to do the plastic
razor I don't know what you call but you
know like the kind that you can both
like used on your face and then you know
use on your legs I'm you know one of the
most famous examples and like one
platform going broke is when Apple
decided to take the gun emoji and make
it into a swert gun and of course
confusing like everything everywhere for
a while but very interestingly enough
like all the other platforms moved to
the children's gun emoji as well and so
it's kind of interesting because in some
ways you can see that the platform's
what they want or decide is like okay or
not okay kind of can get through so like
marijuana emoji or cannabis leaf emoji
we probably have had like 5 to 7
proposals some of them very good you
know it kind of hits a lot of you know
the factors like distinct shape does it
have a meanie isn't probably demand yes
yes and everyone's like nope like we're
not gonna do this one you know and and
you know cuz they're all like whatever
family-friendly companies who have like
vested interest like all around the
world
including cultures that are much more
conservative so one little fun fact is
many of the alcohol emoji are not
actually the alcohol they are the
container for the alcohol so it's a wine
glass emoji and it's not a wine emoji
this a beer mug emoji not beer and that
was sort of down out of concern of the
of like that the Muslim countries might
like have an issue I don't think they
actually did I think was just done
proactively as a concern so I have my
own personal example of something going
rogue for a long time we had the
dumpling emoji and we specifically gave
the image being like a empanadas and
pierogi ish you know sort of like the
crescent shape and then like Facebook
randomly did like a Shaolin bow like a
soup dumpling style like a little round
one which like by itself like even
though the guidance image was not that
even there like the key words included
like empanadas and pierogi it was I
literally think it was like some
Facebook designer who like went rogue
because they like soup dumplings and I
actually spent so much time lobbying
each and every like Facebook person in
the like emoji hierarchy are you trying
to get them to switch and they finally
did so that was it was my little like
impact in trying to get the consistency
of all the those images together more
questions yes yes you should you should
I don't know how old your phone is but
you should you should have like years
really you should well dumpling came in
2017 so I will find you your dumpling on
your was out I know I know for whatsapp
does have its own yeah
yeah so you will have very different
versions of emoji depending on the
platform so a good example is Twitter
there's Twitter web emoji Twitter web is
actually sometimes the first time the
first of the first to market because
they can just roll it out on the web and
that those were override whatever
operating system you generally are
sitting on you know that being said the
I think a long time Apple user Facebook
used to just default to the local
operating system and then for a bunch of
like competitive reasons and consistency
reasons across like you know around the
world
they wanted their own set of emoji and
then they override whatever the local
operating system is by and so yeah like
that's why all the more important they
should be at least somewhat consistent
in their look and whatsapp whatsapp is
kind of interesting they're the most
rogue of all of the the platform says
it'll just like kind of go out there and
do something said they were the first to
implement both Texas flag emoji like you
know and then and then transgender flag
emoji so which is so nice because there
was like this big debate about like in
the transgender flag is it really the
you know a stable flag given that's less
than twenty years old and like you know
whatsapp was like we're just gonna do it
and so they just they just introduced it
and all it forced the hand of all the
other operators and so I give whatsapp I
don't know who they are you know
whatever like little rogue emoji kind of
posse there is inside the organization
but I give him credit for being like
fearless and like going out there on
that but yes all they they very it's
like and it just kind of depends on you
know what what what setting you know the
apps have in terms of overriding yes
yeah what does it mean I don't even know
oh but there just is a middle finger yes
there is a middle finger emoji yeah yeah
yeah thanks thanks to Michael thanks to
the Irish contingent on the
international standards organization
that guy who passed it also is the one
who came and gave us the Vulcan hands
the Vulcan signal the so this the more
general question is how how conscious is
the committee of things with a double
entendre they can be as conscious as
they can be given that they're you know
we skew like older white engineers plus
now a smattering of like Asian women who
like and like well like younger white
women who are on the design part of the
committee like sometimes we don't know
literally I remember the headlines
coming out like earlier this year and it
was like Unicode has passed a tiny penis
emoji and I was like what the hell are
they talking about I was literally like
moisture like what did we pass and it
turns out that there we like pass this
thing that was like like like pinching
or not pinching but it's like you know
very small thing and like I honestly
like that came up zero in any into
deliberations like we I saw I'm gonna
you know like I emailed the list and I
was like just goes to show like kinds of
you know you never anticipate like what
people will take an emoji to mean I'm
like right now like from what I hear
white sir what I hear milk is now being
used as a symbol for like white
nationalism like that was also kind of
unexpected so in some ways what's
wonderful about language is that it
evolves in sign Amick and it's crash
screw-top and it shouldn't be controlled
by likely no to centralized posse in
Silicon Valley but you know we we we are
conscious about like certain things
having connotations like rope emoji is
coming down the pipeline there's a lot
of debate about like like you know all
the kinds of negative ways that rope can
be used in contacts and how different
cultures might react differently to
- rope emoji soo in as much as like you
know this small posse of people can
debate there's also we also put the
emoji out for comment on a certain point
of people will come back with thoughts
for things that we didn't know yes in
that region right like mati emoji yeah
as a person yes so this is an issue yes
right right right
so two questions it's like what about
all the foods from parts of the world
that get like are not recognized by like
people who sit in the room in Mountain
View California or sometimes Sunnyvale
Justin thanks Cupertino sometimes San
Jose what essentially some mostly
Silicon Valley so that first question is
yeah
that's an issue this is like I spent a
lot of time like fighting for more
representative foods like I would really
like foo-foo which is like you know the
being kind of like a carbohydrate like
ball of yellow stuff white stuff in
Africa but it it's not Brecon it's not
like it's super recognized by people
sitting in that room and say you have to
like spend all this time trying to
convince them I remember arepa we just
passed a rape uh like I I honestly like
kind of how to like go to the mat for
this rape because you're like add like
it doesn't like I don't recognize it I'm
not you don't recognize it but trust me
like like people who see this will know
that it's a repo you know to the point
where there's even an ASCII kind of like
symbol for arepa which is like you know
parentheses slash slash close
parentheses and that is is locally how
they can
like signal to someone I want to rape
but I'm like if they can do that through
ASCII clearly means something to them so
it's it's a lot of it's it's a lot of
battles in our little you know c-span
level discussions emoji so then the
second question is why is Unicode the
one who are encoding these emoji and
like you know all the kind of moral
implications that come with that - they
come it came to Unicode because Unicode
is very good at standardizing and it
standardizes across the major platforms
like Microsoft and Apple and Google
being the major ones I mean there are
some other ones in there but those are
the three major ones and so there they
they standardize things and so they were
the ones who standardized these whether
or not they should continue to see in
her eyes
probably consensus is no but where does
it go next and like who else would do it
you know is there a process to sort of
like decentralize it that is all active
debate I mean I can trust you know the
old schoolers in Unicode don't love
these debates about should we have skin
tones on you know vampires like that is
not a debate they want to have they care
sometimes more about the new coding in
minority languages around the world and
you know trying to preserve cultural
heritage so but it's just a way that it
evolved you know we can do what we can
in that Kedah
more questions should we go okay I
didn't know how the livestream works so
like we can just keep on going but why
don't we just keep on going
so much Japanese representation yes so
much Japanese representation I mean
there's like all the holidays a lot of
the foods love hotel Oh on the committee
itself yeah I see I know it's like
partially okay so why are there not
Japanese people on the committee so one
a lot of the chapters is not Japanese
company and so on the committee that
being said one of the original proposers
of the you know the sort of emoji set
was a man named cat momoy who is
Japanese Japanese like Japanese American
probably at this point and a lot of the
other people who are active especially
from the from the Google side they're
internationalization team is very
international they show up maybe so once
in a while I mean like the whole like
bean debate I came from the desire to
have a soy bean and I think in general
it's like who can show up four times a
year in that room like I just happened
to be able to do that because I you know
I have a career that allows me to be
flexible but it is a lot of time and
it's very very far for many people to
travel and I think on some level like
Japan it isn't super into much like they
did their thing with emoji to kind of
put it on the world and they're pretty
well representative so it's not like
they have to like go and fight you know
for like the onigiri emoji or anything
like that so that's kind of I think
that's kind of my take and also like if
they're gonna pick their battles they
take they tend to pick it over the
encoding the actual like kanji
you know here Tigana katakana kind of
stuff it's like yeah about this that's
where my take I mean I might be like
generalizing but I I don't we haven't
like had like these fervent battles with
Japanese folks on emoji I would say tada
are we good are we done one more no
worries
yeah yeah yeah yeah so the questions
like inappropriate use of emojis and
whether or not the the apps on one day
have a spellchecker of grammar sure I do
think that one thing is that emoji usage
tends to be very localized in terms of
like you you have like little dialects
emerge so like we have the u.s. dialect
but that is different from how they use
the emoji in like Japan or China which
is very very different right there
mostly and sort of a closed WeChat
sticker world and maybe different from
France and the so so you know like a
very interesting example is like now the
peach has involved as a symbol of an
peach mint right or just a peach and the
little herb thing for peach mint but
that's very specific to like an English
short of rebus construction so what is
my take on it I don't know okay I would
say that the apps will suggest things I
don't know they over they'll like do the
little red squiggle underneath anytime
in the near future like maybe in like 10
years or so but I feel like at this
point where there's everyone still just
trying to figure out like how do you get
the emoji on as opposed to like trying
to prevent people from saying like like
bad thinks and it's very funny because I
actually was just at I just gave a
session a big lecture we're literally
like someone who's like a total adult in
the class had no idea what the eggplant
emoji meant you know and and we're like
where have you been for the last like
five or six years but I think it's it is
kind of interesting to see like all
these connotations like hop on and off
different emoji it's like one of the
interesting examples is the peach emoji
at a certain point a couple years ago
Apple updated it to be less but like and
then they were like protests like howls
and how is it protest during the beta
kind of rollout and then to their credit
they flipped it back so now you have
your peach emoji just like you want it
thank you very much I think I think
that's a good way to leave the lecture
[Applause]