The woman who decides how Google's emojis look like
What's the story
Jennifer Daniel is the director of Android emojis at Google, or more loosely, the company's emoji interpreter. While she doesn't personally come up with new emojis, she does design the one's that make the cut. She decides how emojis will look like and what will make them more "Googley." "I think every emoji is an extension of the brand," she told CNBC.
Look and feel
Daniel's design process is both broad and detail-oriented
"What lines from a frisbee will make it feel like it's spinning and moving forward?" is the kind of highly detailed thought process that goes behind designing emojis. The Unicode Consortium, a group that includes tech giants like Google, Facebook, Huawei, and Netflix, picks the actual content and votes on fresh emojis every year. Notably, anyone can submit an emoji proposal.
Interpretation
How emojis are differently rendered across platforms
According to Daniel, the confusion between the same emoji on different platforms happens because companies like Apple and Google hardly communicate with regards to maintaining a standard interpretation. "We're both on the Unicode subcommittee for emoji, but those discussions are largely about content, experience, and file-size, not design," she said. For example, the different rendition of the "dizzy eyes" emoji often creates confusion.
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Difference in design
Daniel said, "Apple really fetishizes design so all of its emojis are highly rendered and feel like real objects. At Google, we want you to smile when you think of our products. Our emojis are more cartoonish. Samsung's are more heavily influenced by anime."
Twitter Post
Android, iOS, Microsoft, Facebook, Samsung
Get it together, Samsung. 🙄 pic.twitter.com/NtJ0fa86EB
— Jennifer 🥗 (@jenniferdaniel) May 6, 2017
Complicated discussions
People request biracial couple emoji more than anything else: Daniel
Even though in theory Unicode's list consists of a genderless "person" emoji, platforms are not able to support it yet because of complex UX and file-size problems. Technically, it is possible to make every human emoji available in "man," "woman," and "person" with customizable skin tones, but it has to be done in a way that's not clumsy and doesn't require huge memory space.
The future
Daniel hopes for way more emoji customization
According to Daniel, in the future, emojis will be much more customizable. Users will be able to change the direction and color of any emoji. For example, turning the "ocean wave" emoji red could signify menstruation. "It won't just be about creating new emojis, it will be about creating experiences about how to interact with those emojis," she said.
Information
Daniel used to be graphics editor at New York Times
Daniel's current favorite is the "cowboy" emoji and her least favorite is the "hug" emoji because it looks quite different across platforms. "If the hands are too far then they look like feet. If they're too close it looks like they're going to grope you."