Happy World Emoji Day

World Emoji Day is Today. Here's How (And Why) to Celebrate

According to emoji lore, emojis first appeared in Japan (where else?) in 1999, when a telecom company created 176 cartoon-like images for the text-based emoticons people had used on mobile devices to express basic emotions. They quickly caught on, as texting became a standard mode of communicating.

World Emoji Day began in 2014 when users of Apple devices noticed that Apple’s calendar apps showed July 17 as the date on the calendar on its icon. A tweet appeared in July 2014 announcing the day as the official World Emoji Day. It has grown ever since, with more celebrations around the world happening each year.

World Emoji Day 2018 marks the fifth such celebration of emojis, which in less than two decades have gone from a marketing gimmick to a mode of communication that spans all languages.

In 2009, emoji fans began translating Herman Melville’s Moby Dick into emojis. By 2015, the Oxford Dictionaries had chosen an emoji for its word of the year (“face with tears of joy”) and by 2017 most communication platforms employing emojis included a diversity pack to reflect different races and cultures that had adopted them.