These working women emojis are nominated for Design of the Year

Aug 16, 2017

A range of emojis depicting 'professional women' have been nominated for Design of the Year by the Design Museum in London.

The characters, designed by Google, which show women as doctors, mechanics and scientists are due to be released on android by the end of 2017.

Speaking about the emoticons, a spokesperson for the tech company said: "We believe this will better reflect the pivotal roles women play in the world.”

The emojis were developed last year in an effort to empower young women and highlight the diverse career paths available to them.

The update will also include engineers, coders, farmers and professors, which will all be available in various skin tones.

According to The Telegraph, experts at London's Design Museum selected the symbols alongside 62 other works from the areas or architecture, digital, fashion, graphics, product and transport.

An overall winner, as well as winners from each category, will be announced on January 25, 2018.

Google's self-driving car and the 2012 Olympic Torch are among the previous designs to scoop the top prize.

Mermaids and dinosaurs?! Brand new emojis are on their way

Lifestyle

Mar 23, 2017

by Amber Saunders

The black heart emoji was probably our favourite addition to the last emoji update, and now it's time again to welcome a few more on board.

Nearly 70 new emojis are coming our way later this year, including a mermaid, a dinosaur, a genie in a bottle and a woman in a hijab.

69 new emojis coming June 30 including mermaid, genie, T-Rex, UFO. Here they are: pic.twitter.com/bu4BU42zRf

— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) March 22, 2017

However, some of the new additions are probably not needed. When are we ever going to use a can of tomatoes?!

Refinery29 reports that Unicode, the company responsible for approving all emojis, will release the new set in June 2017.

We just can't wait to use the mermaid! *Just keep swimming*

Oh, and while we have you; don't forget to have your say in the inaugural SHEmazing Awards this May! It's time to vote, and you can do it right here!

Gah! Twitter releases Christmas emojis and they are festive AF

Entertainment

Dec 22, 2016

by Amber Saunders

The countdown is on, and with only three days to go until Christmas, it's safe to say we've already had ridiculous amounts of mince pies, festive jumpers and glitter.

And if all that wasn't enough, Twitter has released festive emojis to get us all excited for D-Day.

To get involved in the emoji-loving antics, all you have to do is tweet one of these hashtags to generate the emoji.

#MerryChristmas
#HappyChristmas
#HappyHanukka
#HanukkahSameach
#Hanukkah
#Chanukah
#HappyKwanzaa
#HabariGani
#Kwanzaa

Twitter also analysed their data to find out what people want most this holiday season, and it turns out Mariah had quite the influence on us.

They found out the most popular word after the sentence 'All I Want For Christmas Is…'.

You
Sweater(s)
Attention
Love
Music
[More] money
[A lot of] food
Clear Skin
[More] sleep
Good grades
[Team Name – mostly college football] to win
Gift Card [to…]
A million dollars
Boyfriend / Girlfriend

The creator of emojis reveals his favourite and it’s just the CUTEST

Oct 29, 2016

by Amber Saunders

Before emojis came on the scene all we had to work with was the letters and symbols on our keyboards, and to be honest, we ended up with some pretty dodgy signs for laughing faces – remember putting a whole load of ':L' or ':P' at the end of a text?!

So that's why we need to be really thankful to Shigetaka Kurita, who created the emojis we love and use today.

While speaking to The Guardian recently, Shigetaka said that he never thought emojis would become as popular as they are today (he created his first batch of them way back in 1999, FYI).

''I’m surprised at how widespread they have become. Then again, they are universal, so they are useful communication tools that transcend language.''

And even though he must have made thousands of emoijs in his time, his favourite isn't anything flashy or cool; it's actually the sweetest one there is.

''I still have a soft spot for the ones that communicate positive emotions.'

''I would say the heart is my all-time favourite.''

Brilliant! What's your favourite one? We love the sassy girl.

Amber Rose ripped off Kim’s emojis because it made her MILLIONS

Apr 1, 2016

by Amber Saunders

Amber Rose has debuted her new emoji app – and it looks extremely like Kim Kardashian's.

The pair are known to have had a bit of beef in the past, but since they shared a photo together (after Kanye and Wiz Khalifa's fight), everything seems to be cleared up.

According to TMZ, Amber made $4 million (€3.5m) from the app, and received $2 million (€1.75m) just by signing on to the company that developed the emojis.

The website claims that Amber said her app had nothing to do with Kim's, but with a whole load big booties and stripper poles, we'd say Ms Rose took some inspo from her ~~rival~~ BFF.

Yesss! Nina Dobrev’s emoji birthday party was total fancy dress goals

Jan 12, 2016

by Amber Saunders

Actress Nina Dobrev no doubt had a sore head at the Golden Globes after party on Sunday night, after spending all of Saturday evening at a party of her own – for her 27th birthday.

The Vampire Diaries star took to Instagram today to share some snaps from what looks like a downright amazing fancy dress bash.

Just take a look at her heart-eyed cat emoji costume if you don't believe us:

"Thank you to all of my amazing friends for coming out to my Emoji Themed Birthday Party at @aventinehollywood on Saturday," the birthday girl wrote alongside a snap of her dancing with a sparker-lit cake.

"I know it was a lot to ask, making it costume mandatory, and they not only did it, everyone showed up dressed to impress and went all out!"

In true wild Hollywood style, there was even an impromptu limbo session:

"Here's to celebrating 27 years, but NEVER growing up! #StayYoungForever," the actress captioned her birthday snaps.

We'll take an invite to her 28th birthday, please.

ALL the bacon! These new emojis pretty much sum up our lives

Nov 24, 2015

by Amber Saunders

It is surely a sign of the times when we become excited for the release of new emojis when we could just use our WORDS, but some of these are pretty darn useful.

In fact, we can’t believe we didn’t have some of them before!

The Unicode Consortium, who approves the standardisation of new emojis, has just revealed its latest designs, which we can expect to see next year once approved.

So without further ado, here are the little people and things that we simply cannot wait to have at our fingertips.

The bride will FINALLY find her groom

The dancer in red will have a partner (and she lucked out because he is not unlike John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever)

Santa Claus will be reunited with Mrs Claus

The princess will find her prince (nawh)

Oh and cut out the hassle of a major pregnancy announcement because you can now just do it with an emoji!

There will also be a selfie emoji, a clown, a cowboy, a Pinocchio lying emoji and FINALLY a shrugging emoji!

And while we think we will definitely find the potato useful, we are particularly excited about BACON (and champagne obvs).

Bring them on!

Spell it? Oxford Dictionary’s ‘word of the year’ is definitely NOT a word

Nov 17, 2015

by Amber Saunders

Every year, the good people behind the Oxford English Dictionary release an official 'Word Of The Year' – and this year's entry is stirring up quite a bit of confusion.

To give you a sense of the types of words that generally make the cut, 2013 was officially the year of the 'selfie' which is impressive considering the word was only entered into the dictionary in that same year.

'Selfie' and 'vape' (2014's entry) might make some sense, but this year's word of the year is sure to get you scratching your heads.

Without further ado, the 2015 official word of the year is…

While it may be one of our favourite emojis (after the dancing lady in red and the embarrassed monkeys obvs), we are still not quite sure how the officially titled 'laughing with tears of joy' emoji constitutes a word.

"Emojis have been around since the late 1990's, but 2015 saw their use, and the use of the word 'emoji', increase hugely," a spokesperson for the dictionary explains.

"The 'face with tears of joy' emoji was chosen because it was the most used emoji globally in 2015."

So there you have it folks! Mark this day as the day that an emoji has officially been recognised as a word.

What next? Smart phones being recognised as pets? Puh-lease.

Curly-haired women just got their very own set of AMAZING emojis

Nov 5, 2015

by Amber Saunders

Smartphone users have thousands of emojis at their disposal, but not one of them features a woman with curly hair.

As the original emoji keyboard was designed in Japan, it stuck with the straight hair so often seen in Asian culture. But here in Ireland (and elsewhere in the world) the majority of us have waves, if not full-on curly locks.

When beauty brand Dove got wind of this glaring gap, it decided to do something about it, to help promote the beauty of naturally curly hair.

A spokesperson for Dove's owner Unilever said the company thought it was "wrong" that curly-haired women couldn't find an emoji that looked like them, so to help it's designed the first Dove Love Your Curls Emoji Keyboard.

Research by Dove found that just 10% of women and 40% of young girls actually like their curly hair in its natural state.

But we reckon that might change when they see this epic heart-eyes emoji:

Or this kissy-face one:

Or, of course, this crying-laughing face:

The emojis come in a range of skin tones, hair colours and hair types, and the whole keyboard can be downloaded via the App Store or Google Play.

Plus, if you tweet using the hashtag #LoveYourCurls, Twitter will automatically generate a curly-haired gal for you. Win!

These are the 67 Emojis that are coming your way next year

Oct 12, 2015

by Amber Saunders

We all love our emojis, in fact, most of us use them in nearly every text or message we send – and soon there's going to be a lot more to choose from.

The Unicode Consortium, which oversees all of our emoji needs has just released a new batch of possible candidates, which you can view here.

These 67 candidates will be voted on next May, and the approved ones will be released June 2016.

We've seen some of these emoji variations before, but for the most part there will be new faces, foods, hand gestures, animals and transportation devices.

For faces, we love the Pinocchino-inspired nose – perfect for when you catch your little sister lying!

There's also a rolling on the floor laughing face, a drooling face for when your favourite food blogger posts a new recipe and a sneezing face for when you have a cold!

There are also new animal options such as an owl, gorilla, rhino and shark.

Now, before we get too excited, these are just candidates and the designs we're seeing are just preliminary and might change – but the general idea of the emoji will remain the same.

We're just going to have to wait until next June to find out!

New emojis revealed… and they could help combat bullying

Sep 22, 2015

by Amber Saunders

Everyone these days seems to have serious affection for emojis. Every time an updated collection is announced the whole internet rejoices at the prospect of finally being able to use a unicorn in their everyday conversations.

Taking this love of animated characters into account, Vodafone Ireland has launched their #BeStrong initiative to help combat the problem of cyberbullying.

A survey conducted by YouGov on behalf of Vodafone found that one in every four Irish teenagers has been cyber-bullied. 29 per cent of those teenagers admitted to feeling completely alone and 25 per cent revealed that as a result of cyber-bullying they had experienced suicidal thoughts.

However, nine out of ten teens said that they would find it easier to cope with bullies if they had the support of their friends on social media. While many said they would find it hard to find the right words to use to show support to a friend being bullied, 74 per cent of Irish teens said they would use an emoji to express support for their friend.

The #BeStrong campaign aims to provide teens with a collection of emojis which they can use to show each other support online when. Vodafone CEO Anne O'Leary explained:

"It is difficult for young people to show compassion and support for their friends in words if they are being bullied online. We have all been tongue-tied teenagers at some stage and have difficulty expressing what we feel. I hope that our research and the new emojis will be of some help in the battle against cyber bullying."

The emojis chosen for the campaign were selected by the 5,000 teens surveyed. The selection was designed by Vodafone and its anti-bullying panel which Berkeley University Professor Dacher Keltner – the psychologist who advised on the creation of the characters for Pixar film Inside Out.

The emojis are available for download and there is also a special video that highlights the importance of teens being able to support one another through instances of bullying.

Cheese, burritos and UNICORNS: We’re finally getting new emojis

Lifestyle

Sep 10, 2015

by Amber Saunders

Forget the iPhone 6s and the iPad Pro, there's another new development in tech-land that has us super excited.

Apple's iOS 9.1 update launches sometime later this year, and it will include a heap of new emojis.

Here's what seems to be the full collection, though no doubt there are a few that escaped the notice of the eager developers who got to try out iOS 9.1 in beta today.

Glam types will be pleased to know that champagne and cheese now feature, while animal-lovers will enjoy the lion, crab and squirrel additions.

And like any emoji keyboard, it also includes a tonne of totally random bits and bobs, like unicorns, squash rackets and microscopes.

Pretty much every category has had a few new symbols added, so there will be a lot to keep you entertained once the new update drops.

The new update is expected to launch shortly after the iPhone 6s is relelased, so we can hopefuly be firing burrito emojis back and forth by the end of the year.

Win.