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Exclusive: Google releases 53 gender fluid emoji
[As emojis] become more inclusive, each becomes less universal. Jennifer Daniel, designer at Google, thinks about this deep irony at the heart of visual language all the time. She traces it back to the age-old problem with the male bathroom symbol. "That person could be man, woman, anyone," she says. "But they had to add a little detail, that dress, and suddenly that person symbol doesn't mean person anymore; it means man. And that culture means a man-centered culture."
While Daniel can't fix our bathroom signage, as the director of Android emojis, she can fix another problem: The lack of gender-neutral symbols in texting. She can give us the zombies, merpeople, children, weightlifters that are neither male nor female. "We're not calling this the non-binary character, the third gender, or an asexual emoji–and not gender neutral. Gender neutral is what you call pants," says Daniel. "But you can create something that feels more inclusive."
Google is launching 53 updated, gender ambiguous emoji as part of a beta release for Pixel smartphones this week (they'll come to all Android Q phones later this year). Whether Google calls them "non-binary" or not, they have been designed to live between the existing male and female emoji and recognize gender as a spectrum. Given that Google collaborates with many of its rivals on emoji, it's likely that Apple and others will release their takes on genderless emoji later this year.
Daniel sits on the Unicode consortium–the organization that sets core emoji standards, including signifiers like gender and other details, that designers at Apple, Google, and other companies then follow to create their emoji. Last year, she pointed out that there were 64 emoji that, according to Unicode's standards, were never meant to signify gender. In fact, 11 don't have a Unicode-defined signifier for male or female at all–like baby, kiss, fencing person, and snowboarder. As for the remaining 53, they could be male, female, or neither.
Yet Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, and, yes, Google, have often assigned genders with their designs for these emoji. It's why every construction worker across major operating systems is, by default, is a man. Unicode's standards dictated a construction "person," but tech companies decided to design them as construction men (and add women as a secondary option).
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(Score: 4, Insightful) by SomeGuy on Saturday May 11 2019, @04:19PM (5 children)
That is part of the problem with using highly detailed graphics as a symbol. You wind up communicating much more than than what was probably intended. A simple smiley may become a particular kind of smile. The appearance may imply a certain style that may change as the years go by. In this case apparently someone created emoji that that imply what they have in their pants.
Wouldn't be a problem if they kept it simple in the first place. :) :P :-/
Well, OK, there is 8===D and (.)(.) :-[]
(Score: 3, Funny) by takyon on Saturday May 11 2019, @04:56PM
Honk, honk 🤡🌎 👌💯 🔥🔥🔥
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 11 2019, @05:06PM (2 children)
20 years ago when I was spending time on IRC I always felt that :P is feminine.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 11 2019, @05:56PM (1 child)
I used that one a lot, but it was meant as a sarcastic smiley on par with the winking sarcastic smiley. Perhabs I've been misunderstood all this time.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Arik on Saturday May 11 2019, @06:36PM
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Saturday May 11 2019, @06:44PM
I have no idea what you mean.
signed, 🍆🥜
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