Words have always been the starting point for expressing yourself, but in today’s day and age, words
This #InternationalInternetDay, celebrate the journey of emojis in India
Words have always been the starting point for expressing yourself, but in today’s day and age, words alone just don’t cut it. Over the last five years, Twitter has seen new ways of communicating on the service, with GIFs, memes, videos, and more, but perhaps the most friendly and easy-to-use way of expressing oneself has become the emoji. From a combination of punctuation marks 🙂 and then a small (mostly-yellow) symbol, emojis have become some of the most relatable symbols on the internet, representing different and diverse aspects of our lives.
This #InternationalInternetDay, as we celebrate the evolution of conversations on the internet, here is a look at how custom emojis on Twitter have come to connect with Indians from across the country.
While people on Twitter have always had access to a standard set of emojis, specific hashtags at different periods of time have activated a limited-time emoji for special occasions to delight people on Twitter, sparking conversations.Custom emojis in India were first launched on the service in 2015 with 13 creative symbols to connect with audiences. Taking a cue from the popularity of these emojis, over the years this grew to 39 in 2016, 62 in 2017, 39 in 2018, 86 in 2019, and 50 in 2020 till September.
Looking back, Twitter in India has introduced several custom emojis that emphasise aspects of local culture, entertainment, sports and current affairs in the country.
Sports fandom in India is extremely active. Tournaments and sports leagues give people the opportunity to ex press their views and converse and connect with like-minded fans on the service. Owing to the massive po pularity of this segment, 43% of the custom emojis on Twitter in India have belonged to the sports vertical.
Indian Twitter has witnessed massive growth in conversations around movies, TV, music and lifestyle, which is why around 11% of the custom emojis launched on the service are around entertainment.
Audiences on Twitter love to celebrate festivals and diverse cultures on the service. Adding momentum to these stimulating conversations, several emojis have allowed Indians to connect with various aspects of their culture. Till date, 32 emojis reflected various aspects about Indian culture.
Similarly, around 27 emojis related to current affairs and news moments such as assembly and state elections have been introduced.
Thanks to influential, leaned-in audiences that shape conversations, Twitter has become the go-to space for brands across sectors to launch new products and connect with their consumers. Custom emojis play a fund amental role in bringing these campaigns alive. 26% of the custom emojis launched in India are in service of brands and their campaigns.
These “Indian emojis” are not just popular at home. Several emojis that are relevant to Indian audiences have gained international popularity as they cross national boundaries connecting with the diaspora too. For exam ple, the #GaneshChaturthi emoji in 2016 became a global trend and the launch of the emoji of the Rajnikanth movie #Kaala in 2018 trended in multiple geographies.
As Twitter serves the public conversation, encouraging positive, diverse points of view, emojis provide a fun way for anyone to express themselves on the service.
EMOJIS AT A GLANCE: AN OVERVIEW
- Since 2015, there are almost 300 India centric custom emojis
- Among these, almost 68% emojis were introduced for special Indian events and moment, for example, Independence Day, #CWC19, Indian festivals, and national and assembly elections.
- The first-ever Indian emoji was the #MakeInIndia emoji, introduced in Nov 2015.
Celebrations for the 10th anniversary of IPL were taken up a notch when for the first-ever time Twitter created custom IPL emojis for 30 players. MS Dhoni (@msdhoni) and Virat Kohli (@imVkohli) topped the chart of the 10 most-used hashtags for player emojis that year.
Embeddable Tweet: https://twitter.com/IPL/status/849510627110506496
- South superstar Vijay (@actorvijay) became the second film star to receive a custom emoji, based on his character from the movie #Mersal (August 2017)
Embeddable Tweet: https://twitter.com/twitterindia/status/898465872024444928?lang=en
- Till date, around 15 emojis have been introduced on Twitter to get people excited about the launch of various Indian movies.
- Similarly, Hindi movies like #MissionMangal, #Saaho, #Bharat, #Judwaa2, #ZeroFilm, #JabHarryMetSejal, #URI and #GoldMovie have had custom emojis designed to garner increased engagement with audiences on the platform. In addition to #Mersal, Tamil blockbuster movies such as #Kaala2018, #NGK also had an emoji for the launch of the movies on the platform. In January 2020 people could Tweet with #DarbarEmoji for South Indian superstar Rajinikanth’s (@rajinikanth) movie
