Emoji or Emojis are pictograms, logograms, ideograms and smileys used in electronic messages and web pages. The emoji's primary function is to fill in emotional cues otherwise missing from typed conversation. Emojis exist in various genres, including facial expressions, common objects, places and types of weather, and animals. They are much like emoticons, but emojis are pictures rather than typographic approximations; the term "emoji" in the strict sense refers to such pictures which can be represented as encoded characters, but it is sometimes applied to messaging stickers by extension.
Western style emoticons are mostly written from left to right as though the head is rotated counter-clockwise 90 degrees. One will most commonly see the eyes on the left, followed by the nose (often not included) and then the mouth. Typically, a colon is used for the eyes of a face, unless winking, in which case a semicolon is used. However, an equals sign, a number 8, or a capital letter B are also used to indicate normal eyes, widened eyes, or those with glasses, respectively. Symbols for the mouth vary, e.g. ")" for a smiley face or "(" for a sad face. One can also add a "}" after the mouth character to indicate a beard.
|