Emojipedia has just informed us that a range of new emojis will be released in July of 2014 as part of the Unicode 7.0 standard. How many exciting new symbols will there for you to choose from and annoy your friends with? Lots. Lots and lots and lots. So many that I can’t be bothered to count them, because I would be here all freakin’ day if I did that. It’s worth noting that right now, we don’t actually know what any of these new emojis are going to look like; says Emojipedia oh so helpfully, “Images for these emojis will be added to Emojipedia as soon as they are available. This page is a placeholder list of the new emoji names.” That said, though, I can imagine a bunch of them will be absolutely incredible. Like these ones, which I'm confident we'll be able to refer to as...
The Best of the Best:
1. Hot Pepper
The situations in which you could employ a hot pepper are endless: Asking someone if they want to try out that new burrito place near your office... telling your BFF about the hot guy or gal who just walked into the coffee shop with you… complaining about how angry your roommate makes you… reminding your SO to pick up some more Sriracha on his or her way home tonight… the list goes on.
2. Sleuth or Spy
Everyone needs to flex their 007 muscles every now and again, right?
3. Reversed Hand with Middle Finger Extended
Hey, look! We actually know what this one is going to look like! And it’s PERFECT!
4. Wastebasket
Whether you’re talking about something being literal trash or metaphorically trash-talking someone, there are a myriad number of places the wastebasket will undoubtedly find itself. I wonder what the emojinalysis for liberal wastebasket usage would be…?
5. Airplane Arriving
Incoming!
Not all of them are this awesome, though. In fact, a good deal of them are… how shall I put this… uh… useless. Useless is the word. I mean, I noted fairly recently that I don’t really use emojis — but if I did, I would probably still be as baffled as I am now at some of the new picks. Maybe we’ll determine them to be more useful when we know what they look like; in the meantime, though, here are the top 12 most useless new emojis, along with a list of emojis that should probably exist in their stead, but (sadly) don’t. These ones earn the title of...
The Worst of the Worst:
1. Black and White Hard Shell Floppy Disks
Apparently the Emoji Voting Committee has a time machine and spends the majority of their time waiting for the five-minute period every day in which they’re allowed to use it to go back to 1995. Also, we don’t even need one Hard Shell Floppy Disk emoji — so why on earth do we have two? One for the powers of darkness and the other for the forces of light?
Instead: USB drive or thumb stick. If you really need a visual representation of a portable data storage solution, at least update it a little.
2. Label
It’s kind of hard to tell what this might be without, y’know, an actual visual representation. Is it just a blank label? If yes, then… why? Just… why???
Instead: A label that says, “Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya.” Now that’s a label I would use.
3. Man in Business Suit Levitating
You know, I really tried to come up with a reason we might need an emoji of a man in a business suit levitating. I did. But unless you work at the Ministry of Magic, I cannot for the life of me think when you would find yourself needing to inform someone that the well-dressed fellow in the cubicle next to you has suddenly shot up from his seat in favor of the using the ceiling instead. It just seems so unlikely.
Instead: Boy with glasses and scar on forehead. Shorthand for Harry Potter is so much more useful.
4. Linked Paperclips
You guys. Clippy the Microsoft Office Assistant is back. And this time, he brought a small army with him. We are so. Screwed.
Instead: A paperclip bow and arrow. At least them you can share with all your friends exactly what your status is in your office’s inter-departmental Hunger Games reenactment.
5. Trackball
See: Time machine. 1995. What.
Instead: Hamster ball. Way better than a hamster face, and accurately depicts your frustration with outdated emoji options.
6. Slightly Frowning Face and Slightly Smiling Face
I was not aware that emojis were capable of expressing such nuance. If you’re going to “slightly frown” at something, how different is that going to look from totally frowning at it? Is it distinct enough to warrant its own emoji? I’m going to go with “no” on that one.
Instead: Half smiling, half frowning face. Embrace your inner Harvey Dent.
7. Triangle with Rounded Corners
I guess you could maybe pretend it’s a tri-corner hat, but that seems like it’s stretching it a little.
Instead: Cheese. Because for some strange, unknown reason, we can have emojis for triangles with rounded corners, but we can’t have wedges of cheese. Come on, Emojipedia! Everybody loves cheese!
8. Black Droplet
Uh… what? Is it raining tar? Or something?
Instead: Purple rain. If we're dealing with imaginary rain, then let's throw a little Prince in the mix just because we can.
9. Light Check Mark
We already have white check marks and heavy check marks, so I am unsure what necessitated a “light check mark.” Much like the “slightly frowning” and “slightly smiling” faces, you would think any check mark would do, right? Is “light check mark” to be reserved for times when you want to communicate, “Well, I kind of approve of this, but not really, so I don’t want you to think that I’m your BFF now or anything, because I’m not”?
Instead: Light deck-you-in-the-face mark. I don’t think we have one of those yet, right?
10. Mantlepiece Clock
There are already 23 clock face emojis in existence. Is this new “mantelpiece clock” one going to accomplish anything the others don’t? Probably not.
Instead: A TARDIS, DeLorean, or other time machine. If we’re going to go for another timepiece, let’s at least make it an epic one.
11. Symbol for Marks Chapter
I don’t even know what this means.
Instead: Symbol for enough with the emojis already.
