Recently my phone had a software upgrade and this included even more emojis: I now had an emoji for swimming, for surfing as well as celebrating with champagne glasses and bottles and a variety of facial expressions. It is great fun adding these to social media comments, or text messages.
Of course I have tried to send text messages made entirely of emojis – it certainly beats my son’s KK as a response to “How did the exam go?” but I have failed to make myself understood by my husband: at least this is his excuse for not taking food out from the freezer to defrost! Perhaps I need to design my own emojis for more success.
It rather reminds me of the Egyptian Hieroglyphics we were all introduced to when studying ancient history at school. a visual symbol or figure represented an activity, emotion or object. SO my question is, is communication evolving BACKWARDS?
The challenge with posting on Social media or even texting is that increasingly we have a tendency to miss words out, so they can be misunderstood. Even worse: these comments can be misconstrued – sometimes causing offence. A 🙂 or 😉  because we have missed out some ‘essential’ words and the nuance from hearing the comment spoken, or even the non-verbal communication, such as a wink or facial expression.
Emojis can be real fun, but are they replacing traditional communication styles? We know there are colleagues who sit next to each other, yet never speak: they send texts or emails! Is our language evolving into a series of emojis??? Is visual communication taking over from aural???
Being a communications expert, this is something I am particularly interested in. I am therefore thrilled to find there is a lecture on this subject at the Design Museum on 27th September. Here are details. I have bought two tickets and would love to take a guest. If you would like to accompany me as my guest apply here.
When YES creates opportunities