Browse Definitions :
Definition

emoji

An emoji is a small image, either static or animated, that represents a facial expression, an entity or a concept (among other possibilities) in digital communications.

The emoji is the graphical successor to the emoticon, which represented similar things through sequences of characters, such as :) to stand for a smiley face. Depending on the application, an emoji may be inserted simply by clicking the desired image or converted from text characters. Emoji collections are widely available on social networking sites, smartphone apps and other messaging platforms.

The word emoji is made up of Japanese words meaning picture (e) and character (moji). The first emoji were created by Shigetaka Kurita, who borrowed the idea from weather forecasts that used symbols, Japanese characters, street signs and manga, a style of Japanese comic that -- like Western cartoons -- uses a standard group of symbols to express emotions and concepts. The Japanese telecommunications companies NTT DoCoMo, au and Vodafone (now SoftBank Mobile) each created their own proprietary collections of emoji.

As the number of emoji has increased, the meanings of many have become more open to interpretation. While basic emoji like the smiley or winky faces are generally understood in the same way by most viewers, an image of a man with blue triangles over his head or one with two open hands touching at the wrist and facing forward might be interpreted in a number of ways (Their official meanings, however, are "man bowing" and "whatever.").

This was last updated in October 2015

Continue Reading About emoji

Networking
  • remote infrastructure management

    Remote infrastructure management, or RIM, is a comprehensive approach to handling and overseeing an organization's IT ...

  • port address translation (PAT)

    Port address translation (PAT) is a type of network address translation (NAT) that maps a network's private internal IPv4 ...

  • network fabric

    'Network fabric' is a general term used to describe underlying data network infrastructure as a whole.

Security
CIO
  • business goals

    A business goal is an endpoint, accomplishment or target an organization wants to achieve in the short term or long term.

  • vertical SaaS (software as a service)

    Vertical SaaS describes a type of software as a service solution created for a specific industry, such as retail, financial ...

  • business process mapping

    Business process mapping is the visual display of the steps within a business process showing how it's done from start to finish.

HRSoftware
  • employee onboarding and offboarding

    Employee onboarding involves all the steps needed to get a new employee successfully deployed and productive, while offboarding ...

  • skill-based learning

    Skill-based learning develops students through hands-on practice and real-world application.

  • gamification

    Gamification is a strategy that integrates entertaining and immersive gaming elements into nongame contexts to enhance engagement...

Customer Experience
  • Microsoft Dynamics 365

    Dynamics 365 is a cloud-based portfolio of business applications from Microsoft that are designed to help organizations improve ...

  • Salesforce Commerce Cloud

    Salesforce Commerce Cloud is a cloud-based suite of products that enable e-commerce businesses to set up e-commerce sites, drive ...

  • Salesforce DX

    Salesforce DX, or SFDX, is a set of software development tools that lets developers build, test and ship many kinds of ...

Close