4 ms·
Because it's wrong. Emoji is a Japanese word, which is the biggest hint they didn't come from Microsoft. (And yes, its a specific subset of Unicode characters,
by deathanatos 3y ago
Because it's wrong.
Emoji is a Japanese word, which is the biggest hint they didn't come from Microsoft. (And yes, its a specific subset of Unicode characters, though that proper use is getting diluted by people using it to refer to any and every inline pictograph in text, even non-Unicode ones, a use more similar to "emoticon" from the 90s… that word seems to have faded into obscurity, largely supplanted by "emoji")
Even "emoticons"¹, or pictographs replacing some text like ":-)" (which is how they were called before the west imported "emoji", largely because it showed up in phone IMEs after its inclusion in Unicode) were definitely a thing in the late 90s. I suspect AIM must have had them before Messenger, but frankly, I didn't think anyone actually used Messenger except maybe business types?
Everyone I seemed to know was on AIM, with a few odd exceptions on Yahoo, if they were normal. If they were more nerdy, IRC, but that was text based. (Though some clients would still translate certain text sequences into pictures. I'm pretty sure, e.g., Trillian could/would, but I don't remember when I adopted it. But it could have been earlier than 2003.)
¹The picture version. As I recall the usage of this word in the late 90s/early '00s, it could mean either ":-)" as text, or the pictogram version thereof, largely because clients at the time would just convert between the two freely. One end might send text, but the receiving client would pictogram it.
- eonwe 3y agoOn chat applications: In Finland no one used AIM and everyone used messenger. I suspect this was the norm also elsewhere in Europe. I am talking about Messenger 4.6 that came built in with windows xp and its later versions, not the business version.
- Ennea 3y agoThe most popular choice in Germany used to be ICQ, at least based on my own friend group and various conversations I've had over the years.
- Tijdreiziger 3y agoIn the Netherlands, MSN Messenger (commonly abbreviated just 'MSN') was essentially a monopoly, although at that time it was only used by young people (older people still just called each other on the phone). With the rise of smartphones though, it ended up being supplanted by WhatsApp, with the ill-conceived migration to Skype killing off most of the last stragglers.
- mcpackieh 3y ago> Emoji is a Japanese word, which is the biggest hint they didn't come from Microsoft. (And yes, its a specific subset of Unicode characters, though that proper use is getting diluted by people using it to refer to any and every inline pictograph in text, even non-Unicode ones, Emoji as originally created/used in Japan were not Unicode, Unicode emoji only came many years later, so referring to non-unicode emoji as emoji isn't improper and doesn't dilute the term.
- Tijdreiziger 3y agoBut the MSN Messenger emoticons from Microsoft were not those Japanese emoji. That term was only popularized with the iPhone.
- mcpackieh 3y agoI didn't say they were, I didn't say anything about MSN messenger. What I said is that Japanese emoji were not originally implemented with Unicode, therefore non-Unicode emoji are not improper or diluted emoji. Emoji does not imply Unicode, Unicode is just an implementation detail of modern emoji, it isn't and never was a defining attribute of emoji; for the first several years of emoji's existence in Japan, Unicode wasn't involved.