OpenMoji 12.0
2019 May
Project Initiators and Direction
Benedikt Groß, Daniel Utz
Emoji are indispensable for daily communication. They are practical (👍), funny (😆) and sometimes quite bizarre (💩🤪🙀🧟). For us, emoji are much more than colorful images decorating fun short messages. We think they are rather part of an important and exciting development: the return of pictorial symbols to written communication. For the first time in history, it is possible to communicate with a combination of letters and icons. Now it becomes feasible to say things and convey meanings that were previously impossible.
Unfortunately, the creative variety of emoji has been rather limited so far, especially when compared to the incredible number of available fonts. At the moment, there is only a dozen emoji sets, most of them from big tech companies. These emoji are visually adapted to the respective appearance of their software platforms. In addition, the usage rights are often very restrictive (e.g. the terms of use of Apple’s emoji).
That is why we have developed OpenMoji as the first open source and independent emoji system to date. When designing the OpenMoji system, we have developed visual guidelines that are not linked to a specific branding. In addition, our goal was to design emojis that integrate well in combination with text.
1.5 years after start the project has started, it is finally done: OpenMoji support the full Unicode Emoji 12 standard now. More than 50 students and 2 professors of the HfG Schwäbisch Gmünd have developed together a system of in total 3,180 emoji: including all flags (🇬🇭🏴🇪🇺), skintones (👨🚀 > 👨🏻🚀👨🏼🚀👨🏽🚀👨🏾🚀👨🏿🚀) and gender variations (👩🧑👨). Beyond the standard Unicode range, OpenMoji also includes special interest categories on topics such as technology and design. We are especially pleased about the contribution of the Guemil Initiative (University Santiago de Chile), whose emergency icons is also part of OpenMoji now.
The OpenMoji project continues, in the next step we will deal with the further development of our platform and the future of Emoji. On a global scale many people are interested in the way they communicate on a daily basis — with OpenMoji we want to provide them with a common, open platform. We hope for diverse contributions over many different disciplines and are curious to see where the journey takes us.
