As JSON must be in Unicode (I think the latest RFC restricts it to UTF-8), there's no actual _need_ to escape emoji. But if you do need to (perhaps you're in an

As JSON must be in Unicode (I think the latest RFC restricts it to UTF-8), there's no actual _need_ to escape emoji. But if you do need to (perhaps you're in an ASCII-only environment), you have to do it that way, yes. Weird. (I asked once, on Stack Overflow, why this was the case, and was merely told that it was historical reasons, which matches what you surmised: it's a relic.)