00:00hi everyone welcome to the Asics Lindsey
00:02podcast I'm sonal today's episode closes
00:05out our special series on network
00:06effects you can find the other pieces at
00:08on a 6nz comm and we're wrapping up by
00:12talking about the taxonomy and types and
00:14evolution of network effects joining us
00:16for that conversation is James courier
00:19who's a co-founder and managing partner
00:21of n FX guild which is an early-stage
00:22accelerator that runs a program for
00:25companies with network effects which can
00:26range with all kinds of businesses also
00:29joining us for that conversation is a
00:316nc partner on O'Hara Hearn and we kick
00:33off this conversation which was recorded
00:35months ago talking about the history and
00:38evolution of network effects before we
00:40break down the taxonomy of network
00:41effects and why all network effects
00:44aren't equal and why the language for
00:46figuring out the differences between
00:48them matters the first time it was used
00:50was 1907 in a annual report by 18 T and
00:55they started noticing that because they
00:57had a lot of people connected to the
00:59telephone network other people wanted to
01:01connect to the network and that each of
01:03their customers got happier when they
01:06got a new customer because they could
01:07now call more people and they said
01:10because of that effect 18 T said I think
01:13we have a pretty good business here and
01:15that was the first time someone coined
01:17the term network effects okay because
01:19the first time I heard about it was I
01:20think when it came to the coinage of
01:22Metcalfe's law correct yeah so that was
01:25during the ethernet era right I think
01:27there was a gap between when AT&T used
01:30it in their annual report and then
01:32Ethernet cards came into practice if you
01:34look at it the net card it's interesting
01:35to note actually network effects began
01:38it was first the telephone then the
01:40Ethernet and in today's world we'll talk
01:42about it in the context of software
01:44companies like Facebook right so
01:46Metcalfe's law in Ethernet card the way
01:48it came about is the cost of the printer
01:50is really high and so the Ethernet card
01:52actually enabled various people to
01:54connect to the printer which reduced the
01:56cost of the device and that was an
01:58incentive for different groups within a
02:01company to even start adapting the
02:02ethernet cards because it the value
02:04proposition was you could subsidize the
02:06cost of the device and you didn't need a
02:08printer for each person so that's how
02:10Matt Guf slaw was born which sort of
02:13measure for network effects okay so just
02:16to clarify by Metcalfe's law you mean I
02:18mean it's not really a law like a lot of
02:19these laws it's really just a
02:20description like a descriptive
02:21formulation that the power of a network
02:23doubles as n number of users get added
02:27to it I think it's exponential increase
02:29in value as each user joins the Blatz
02:32and it was even him who did this I think
02:33it was George Gilder who actually
02:35described this phenomenon but it's that
02:37the value of a network increases
02:39exponentially so square the number of
02:41connections in the network so that's the
02:43Metcalfe law you know from 1907 it took
02:45until 1974 until academics started
02:47looking at this because they started to
02:48see these effects and particularly in
02:50technology businesses and Metcalfe's law
02:53came along a little bit after that and
02:55then you know the network effect of the
02:59Microsoft operating system came to the
03:01fore at the end of the 90s when the
03:02Department of Justice was looking at
03:04whether that network effect that they
03:05had between their operating system and
03:07all of the operating apps on top of it
03:10was just too much and crowding everybody
03:12else out and I think that's that is the
03:14important nugget which is like if you
03:16build network effects you do become the
03:19dominant player in the industry for a
03:20while and that's really why today when
03:23we look at companies internally from an
03:25investing standpoint we try to figure
03:27out a whether they have network effects
03:30or do they have a pathway to achieving
03:31that with effects because it's a big
03:33differentiator from the rest of you know
03:35the from the competitive landscape
03:36network effects are one of the few ways
03:39we have left for software businesses
03:41they have a moat to create a moat around
03:43their business so that competitors can't
03:45eat away at their margins yeah so in the
03:48olden days there was lots of defense
03:49abilities that companies could have you
03:51could have a port in the right spot you
03:52could have a iron mine in the right so
03:54on you could have ways of defending your
03:57business but as we've moved into the
03:58software realm we've eliminated distance
04:01we've eliminated time we've eliminated a
04:02lot of things that used to give people
04:03defense ability and we're really left
04:06with only four major types of defensive
04:09yeah well the ones that we still have
04:13left over our brand and there's actually
04:16three types of brand defense abilities
04:18we have scale like you'd see with an
04:21Amazon right they're just so big they
04:23have such lower prices it's hard to
04:25compete and then you have what we call
04:27and that's typically used by companies
04:30in the b2b space where you embed your
04:33software and doing other corporations
04:34operations to the extent that they can't
04:36take you out and once you're in there
04:37you're defensible so again these are the
04:40four defense abilities and all of them
04:42are valuable and all of them are still
04:43working in the software and the digital
04:45world but the way we look at it is the
04:49network effects is really the only one
04:50that's native to what we're doing and
04:52therefore it's the most powerful when
04:54you say native there is some power in
04:56that word so when you say it's one of
04:57the few native ways the reason why I
04:59think we refer to network effects as
05:01being native right now is really the
05:02evolution of the internet from the web
05:05to mobile so and I usually think of it
05:08as the pre 2000 was as the post 2000 era
05:10because Facebook came post 2000 and so
05:13she'll really became predominant
05:14Facebook is not valuable if you're the
05:17only user on the platform and it was not
05:19just social connections right you find
05:21news through Facebook you find content
05:23through Facebook you'll find events
05:25through Facebook and so it became easier
05:28to derive that value if you compare that
05:30to telephone or Ethernet you still
05:32needed a piece of hardware there was
05:33more friction to get more people to
05:35adopt the hardware that changed then
05:37from the Facebook web era it changed to
05:40mobile that's how you saw all these
05:41messaging even photo sharing apps it
05:43became even easier because mobile phone
05:46enabled you to take pictures you could
05:49communicate via images it was easier for
05:51path phones to build a network I would
05:54argue on mobile more than men I don't
05:56disagree I would just I would maybe take
05:57a different shot at it which is that
05:59it's native to technology in the sense
06:02that the technology wants to connect so
06:06every Ethernet switch connects to every
06:08other Ethernet switch printers are
06:10connected to printers mobile devices are
06:12connected to mobile devices so ever
06:13since the 70s when we started using
06:15chips in our 60s it was endemic to these
06:19technologies that they wanted to be
06:20connected and once connected they become
06:22networks and once networks you have the
06:24chance for network effects and other
06:27cars other products like cars or
06:29toasters or houses or whatever aren't
06:32natively connected physically or through
06:36information sharing so they like an
06:37inherent property yeah so so everything
06:40that is silicon wants
06:41to connect to everything else that
06:42silicon through these little wires that
06:44we have so it's not it's not a it's not
06:46unusual that we would find the first
06:47network of fact come when we first had
06:48our first wires which were the copper
06:50wires are connected the telephone system
06:51I think actually Doug Engelbart was the
06:53first to make that observation about
06:54silicon wanting to connect anyway I
06:56think that's an interesting observation
06:57everything that we touch is connected
06:59and you can't really have a network
07:01effect unless things are connected now
07:03there are types of network effects that
07:05are outside of the technology which we
07:07can talk about let's actually talk about
07:08types of network effects because I think
07:10this is a good opportunity to really
07:11unpack these terms yeah so academic
07:13literature I know tries to classify
07:15network effects at the highest level
07:17into four types right one is direct
07:20network effects which Facebook is a
07:22classic example of where the organic
07:25consequence of the product itself is
07:27that you need to have connections with
07:28other users and therefore you derive
07:30value from the network all this is just
07:32language to try to help give us insight
07:35right insight as we build these
07:37businesses inside as we analyze other
07:39businesses and and and where we want to
07:41take these companies and these
07:42experiences that we create for other
07:43people so this is you know the language
07:46is evolving and and we're changing it
07:47all the time we sometimes use different
07:49words to try to piece it apart but we
07:51actually have identified nine different
07:52types of network effects as a new
07:54pointed out the first one the first
07:57cluster of network effects is what we
07:59call direct Network effects you then
08:01have what we call instead of calling it
08:02local we call it personal because
08:04there's a personal relationship that the
08:06human beings have to each other that
08:09drive their deep adoption of a
08:12particular platform and Facebook would
08:14be a good example of that but it's not
08:15just personal I don't get a lot of
08:17utility out of Facebook it's really sort
08:18of a media it's like instead of watching
08:20TV I use Facebook but I use Facebook
08:22Messenger to do useful things I use
08:24whatsapp to do useful things I've got to
08:26pick up my kids at school
08:28I need that done and I'll use those two
08:30services to get that done now what's
08:32happening with Facebook Messenger is
08:33they're gonna addict payments and
08:34they're adding all sorts of other
08:36utilities and I think that they from
08:39what we can tell from their behavior
08:40have realized that the personal utility
08:43direct network effect is actually more
08:45powerful than a regular personal direct
08:47network that is actually the big point
08:49of the primary we put out around WeChat
08:51it's not the social connection only the
08:53personal connection you're just cry
08:55but the more utility you drive the more
08:57people will use it why does that
09:00distinction matter like why would you go
09:02that far in the taxonomy it matters
09:04because you're going to get a different
09:07level of engagement in terms of activity
09:09so how many times they use it a day
09:11and you're gonna get a longer life arc
09:14of that product right so we all still we
09:17all had telephones between 1900 and 2014
09:21and now we're on the mobile phones and
09:23and we have a personal number as opposed
09:25to being attached to a phone so it
09:26didn't change for 115 years Facebook may
09:30be around in 10 years but it might not
09:32be but it's pretty clear that messaging
09:34will be around because we're always
09:36going to be able to scan text with our
09:37eyes that's a good interface for us and
09:39so messaging is probably a longer term
09:43thing for a network effect business than
09:46just a personal connection and there's a
09:48fourth one and there's a fourth one
09:50which is what we've called market
09:51networks and a market network is a
09:53personal utility but there's money
09:57involved so there's an even greater
09:59reason to you for you to want to stick
10:01with and use it because that's where you
10:02get your money you have a network a
10:04personal direct utility network where
10:07there's money being transacted and so
10:09now you have even more reasons for you
10:10never leave that because hey that's
10:11where I get my income do all
10:13marketplaces have network effects by
10:14definition so I don't I don't think that
10:17all marketplaces have not a network
10:19effects by definition they have the
10:20potential but different marketplaces are
10:23different at different stages of
10:24development in their evolution so a
10:27marketplace that is new and just begun
10:29and say it's six weeks in or ten weeks
10:31and they don't have sufficient liquidity
10:33someone could start that down the line
10:35or even a few weeks from now and they
10:38may have stiff competition
10:39a classic example and we've talked about
10:41this before as well as Airbnb and the
10:43first three years of Airbnb was a real
10:46slog because it's a global marketplace
10:48and they were trying to build supply at
10:51the same time they were also trying to
10:53build demand and they needed to sign up
10:55the homes they needed to make sure that
10:57people were people trusted the
10:59marketplace and felt secure to make a
11:00booking but three years into until then
11:03the growth was really sluggish and you
11:05can almost see it in their graphs that
11:07the room Knights book just started
11:09growing enormous Lee after the third
11:12year because they had sufficient
11:14liquidity both supply and demand and it
11:16started working then we've got three
11:19that are more two-sided network effects
11:22and one of them is let's say we're you
11:25know Microsoft was in the 90s which was
11:28they had a platform we call a platform
11:29two-sided network effect where you have
11:31a piece of software that everyone wants
11:34to plug into and then you have
11:35developers or other companies that plug
11:38into your business so that everyone kind
11:41of has to use it because otherwise they
11:43don't get access to the other side of
11:45the platform we thought that the word
11:47platform described it better it made us
11:49understand what was going on better so
11:51that we can measure our the developers
11:53actually writing software to that
11:55platform and have enough developers
11:58adopted that platform so that we feel
12:00like they're going to have a chance to
12:02win what I find fascinating about this
12:04conversation and also as the person who
12:06loves words for a living is how why the
12:09what we're doing is we're looking for
12:10playbooks to grow the companies with the
12:13network effects and so we need to
12:14identify which type of network effect
12:16are we going for and then we run the
12:17playbook on the growth around that so
12:19now we're up to the two sided network
12:21effects and there's three of them one of
12:23them we call the asymptoting two-sided
12:26marketplace network effect it means it
12:27doesn't keep going doesn't get better
12:29past a certain point we're capable of
12:31seeing someone come in and compete with
12:32them pretty effectively on a lower price
12:34the eighth and ninth network effects
12:36which are again now less strong than the
12:40direct network effects or the direct
12:41network personal utility effects of the
12:44center of the core is what we call
12:46bandwagon effects literally just think
12:47of it as popularity so the the the most
12:50recent good example of that is slack
12:51they do have a real network effect they
12:53do have a real personal direct
12:55utilitarian network effect but they also
12:57have a bandwagon network effect which is
12:59if you're using it too if you're using
13:01HipChat it's kind of cool the bandwagon
13:03effect and language effect are actually
13:05the network effects that exists between
13:06people without any without any software
13:08without any technology actually
13:10connecting which is if I come to you I
13:13new and say you know what I actually
13:14think that hip chats better you're gonna
13:17look at me cross-eyed and say dude
13:19you're not cool you know yeah
13:21I'd say that because that's the
13:23portfolio company right dammit that's a
13:25social reason why it's hard for me to
13:28use another Network and I have to stick
13:30to the network that everybody else has
13:31already adopted and when I use it it
13:34then benefits everybody else for real
13:35network effects but there's a bandwagon
13:37effect which comes first that that
13:39actually is impactful just one quick
13:41question though because when you talk
13:41about different types of defensibility
13:43that companies have in this and from a
13:46previous agent in this current age
13:47that's just brand correct but it's
13:49important to tease out the difference
13:50between brand and a bandwagon when
13:52something's just getting going and
13:53there's everyone wants to get on it for
13:55social reasons that's before it has a
13:57brain a lot of people make this mistaken
13:59assumption my business is growing just
14:01fine and adding all kinds of great value
14:02I don't need any sales and marketing so
14:04it kind of isn't interesting I'd like
14:06that you're distinguishing this because
14:07you know it does make an argument for
14:09why certain leverage he pulled a certain
14:11point that's exactly the point the only
14:13reason we changed this language around
14:14is so that we can figure out what
14:15playbook to run what feature to build
14:17next how much should we spend on the
14:19next feature how much time should we
14:20spend in trying to do that's that's it
14:21that's the only reason we tease these
14:23things out and I think in the bandwagon
14:24also tying it to the viral growth point
14:27it's not sometimes all of a sudden so
14:29the product has to be good for the viral
14:31growth but the key influencers also
14:33matter right like who is using the
14:35product going back to your point who is
14:36using the product who is actually
14:38promoting the product if you look at the
14:40original when they launched Instagram
14:41the people who tweeted that here is the
14:44new app that is Instagram actually
14:46influenced a lot of people to sign up
14:48yeah this point about you know who
14:50starts it to create the bandwagon
14:52matters for almost all the big networks
14:54you can think of it was a guy named
14:55Scott who started rise our yze
14:58in 2000 which was LinkedIn two years
15:02I don't remember he wasn't read huffman
15:04and read knew the top 4,000 people in
15:06Silicon Valley and emailed and then once
15:08we were on all the guys in New York
15:09wanted to be on so where these networks
15:11start matter look there was three
15:13college social networks that came before
15:15Facebook but it was the first one
15:16started at Harvard besides where what
15:19about when when does it actually reach a
15:21point you know you have a network effect
15:22I think these businesses start with
15:24network effects right by their design
15:26right so you're saying it's baked in
15:27from the baked in and then the question
15:30is when do the network effects kick in
15:35can tell it's going to be a ten billion
15:36dollar company when do we know it is at
15:39that point that it is winner-take-all
15:41it's very hard to determine the tipping
15:44point and I think if you ask the
15:46companies themselves they would tell you
15:48that they don't know when it tipped and
15:49there is no single measure of network
15:52effect for a company and different value
15:54to the users at the end of the day you
15:56just want to make sure as there are more
15:57users on the platform is it becoming
16:00more valuable how do you measure what is
16:02valuable and that's different if you're
16:04depending on which company and also the
16:05competitive set because there's three
16:07people going after the same thing and
16:09they're all growing quickly like whoa
16:10yes especially these days with mobile
16:13on-demand services where you have
16:14company in San Francisco another company
16:16in New York and both are growing really
16:18well in their respective cities you know
16:20it's that's not really a network of
16:22right yet it's just know you want to
16:26invest so let's talk about where what
16:28happens when they don't work I mean
16:30let's take the case of like MySpace and
16:31and even a case like Pat because that to
16:34me felt like I mean get granted it was
16:36capped at 150 but like why wouldn't that
16:39why didn't that work Olivia let me talk
16:42about the myspace example I think one of
16:44the key things about network effects is
16:46you need to have product market fit like
16:48you can't just build network effects and
16:49people are not just gonna use your
16:51product without that the challenge with
16:53MySpace was it allows you to sign up
16:56anybody it I loved you to have
16:58connections and with any even strangers
17:01or you know personalities with the page
17:04or influencers and so you don't have a
17:07daily communication with them and I
17:09think that was there are many other
17:11reasons that are cited but that is one
17:12of the reasons the key drivers for why I
17:15think MySpace did not succeed I don't
17:18think they had the strong retention that
17:20Facebook today as well Facebook from day
17:23one measured their repeat usage and that
17:26kept growing our take on MySpace was
17:29that they they didn't actually have a
17:31personal network effect because they
17:33didn't have real names and in fact what
17:35happened with Facebook is that they were
17:37the lucky ones who got to real names in
17:40a social context first so LinkedIn got
17:43their first facebook at their second but
17:45no one at that time was willing to
17:46accept real names in a social that
17:48everybody was a pseudonym myspace
17:51tickle social networking we had 30
17:53million people before Facebook ever
17:54launched but they had real names and so
17:57that it becomes a personal direct
17:59network effect which is stronger than
18:00just a regular Network effect now I
18:02would argue that myspace became
18:05entertainment it became like a TV show
18:06you're gonna watch for two or three
18:07years it didn't become anything with
18:09utility so when you look at at Facebook
18:11Mark Zuckerberg on year three changed
18:15the homepage to say Facebook is a social
18:16utility he knew that he needed to go
18:20toward utility in order to get a real
18:22network effect real names and real
18:24utility was gonna provide you with that
18:26foundation and without that myspace
18:28withered away like any TV show does and
18:30in fact Facebook in the first two years
18:32I believe when they were trying to get
18:33the students to sign up called it as a
18:35student directory because these
18:37universities didn't even have a good
18:38student directory where they could
18:40actually look up and see who else was
18:42taking this course well that was it the
18:44original Facebook yeah it was a physical
18:45Facebook Daddy was that utility for
18:48students to sign up right it was a
18:50utility even from day one right that
18:52makes sense and then how about the case
18:53of path I know that it had a built-in
18:55cap but then at the end of the day my
18:57whatsapp group only has like 20 people
18:59in it and it's incredibly engaged
19:01compared to my facebook yeah I think for
19:03what's up they did crack the utility
19:07piece which helped them build product
19:09market fit yes they hacked the phone
19:11book but that's not what the most
19:13exciting piece about them the most
19:14exciting thing about them is they
19:16targeted international communities where
19:18SMS is expensive and whatsapp was free I
19:22remember I was one of the early whatsup
19:25users because I had to communicate with
19:28my family in India and I was paying
19:30steep amounts being in the US per minute
19:33while whatsup was free and I could
19:35engage with them on a daily she's all
19:37her for a year I remember that's when I
19:38paid a dollar when I signed up yeah but
19:42the international community signed up
19:43because it was an alternative option to
19:46SMS and it was essentially free and they
19:49used the phone book and I think they
19:51kept the product really really simple
19:53and over time they had partnerships with
19:55carriers which pushed whatsapp on to the
19:57phones as well that helped their growth
19:59going back to the past I think past
20:01suffered from competition I think that
20:03once facebook mobile came out and once
20:06you had whatsapp you had so many other
20:07ways of getting the personal utility out
20:09of your phone had there been no
20:11competition like there was for Facebook
20:13when they were growing for two years in
20:15colleges path would have been a big
20:16company okay so you know earlier I was
20:18saying don't confuse virality with
20:19network effects a network effect is a
20:21fent essentially for defense ability and
20:23retention right you continue to use a
20:26product that has a network effect
20:27because because of the network effect
20:30it's not a viral effect is different in
20:33the sense that it gets you new users so
20:35the viral effect is about getting new
20:37users when the network effect is about
20:39keeping those users and they're very
20:40very different things now a network
20:42effect type of a business often has a
20:44lot of interesting hooks a lot of good
20:47raw material to develop viral hooks and
20:50viral pass right and viral loops on top
20:51of but they're different and you when
20:54you're building a network effect
20:55business you build certain features and
20:57language and functionality and when
20:58you're building your viral loops you
20:59build different stuff on top of it and I
21:02think the key distinction especially
21:03from an investment point of view we try
21:05to do is you know is the because is it
21:08while growth or does it also have a
21:10network effect and as James pointed out
21:13you know platforms or marketplaces don't
21:16need to have network and wider growth to
21:18have network effects the other layer I
21:19would add is the result of a viral
21:22growth this year is that your CAC is
21:23pretty much zero right your customer
21:25acquisition cost is zero which is great
21:27we like businesses that are really
21:29growing organic and word-of-mouth but
21:31then we also really care about do they
21:33have the potential to have strong
21:34offense ability and defense ability
21:36great okay well you guys thank you for
21:39all those insights a lot of terminology
21:41but I think it's important thank you for
21:43joining the agency podcast James and
21:44thank you under thank you thank you hi
21:48everyone welcome to the a 6 & Z podcast
21:50I'm sonal today's episode is all about
21:52emoji but it's also about bigger
21:54questions and how innovations come about
21:56from the tension between open standards
21:58and proprietary systems to the economics
22:01of creativity we begin with a tour of
22:03different emoji and how they came about
22:04the politics of emoji where emoji fit in
22:08the taxonomy of visual communication and
22:10why this matters and finally we talk
22:13about the difficulties of translating
22:15and it's not really meant to be a
22:16language joining us for this
22:17conversation are Fred Benenson an early
22:19employee at Kickstarter who built their
22:21he's also infamous for kick starting a
22:23project to translate Moby Dick entirely
22:25into emoji also joining us is Jenny Lee
22:28former New York Times reporter who is a
22:29member of the Unicode Subcommittee on
22:31emoji and who recently led the effort to
22:32get the dumpling emoji which is where we
22:34start the conversation I wasn't a really
22:37big emoji user in fact the first time I
22:39ever heard with moji was when Fred
22:42started his Kickstarter called emoji
22:44dick and I was like what the this
22:47is before they showed up on our iPhones
22:49like perky little yellow faces I was
22:51like what it's like sound something very
22:53bizarre I just started I don't even
22:54actually just made blunt I had a very
22:56hard time using emoji because I didn't
22:58quite understand how to even frankly use
23:00them um I don't understand when people
23:02send it to me if it's not the obvious
23:03heart you know etc but as I've been
23:05using it more I found myself sort of
23:07expressing myself now in kind of quirky
23:09ways and I don't know people really get
23:10it or not but out of it that's the fun
23:13of the showed me exchanged between a
23:17friend of his who was dating a guy and
23:19he would only send her emoji and she was
23:22like I just can't I can't handle this
23:24screenshots of their exchange it was
23:33being like sort of a irreconcilable
23:36difference between people and
23:38relationship fast forward many many
23:40years emoji have showed up on our iPhone
23:42and I'm texting with my friend eing Lou
23:44who's best known as the designer of the
23:46Twitter failed whale
23:47so we're texting back and forth about
23:48like dumplings and so I send her a
23:50picture of the dumplings I'm making and
23:51then she texts me back Nathan fork a
23:53knife and fork yum yum yum yum and she
23:55goes wait apple doesn't have a dumpling
23:58emoji I was like how could that be I was
24:00like cuz there's so many obscure
24:02Japanese food emoji since emoji are from
24:05Japan like you have you know everything
24:06ranging from ramen to Korea rise to
24:09tempura to like the you know the rice
24:12thingies on a stick to there's even then
24:14like triangle rice ball that looks like
24:15it had a bikini wax also the fish cake
24:22I was like how could there not be
24:25dumplings because it's such a universal
24:27food right cuz there's like pierogies
24:29and pullin and Momo's and you know Chios
24:32and empanadas like it's just like a food
24:34from around the world I mean technically
24:36the samosa is the dumpling samosa yeah
24:38ravioli and I was like okay emoji are
24:44universal and then dumplings are
24:46universal how could there not be a
24:48dumpling emoji and just in my mind I was
24:51just like clearly whatever system in
24:53place has failed how do you solve a
24:55problem like the dumpling yeah and I
24:56found out that emoji are regulated by
24:58the Unicode consortium which is a
25:00nonprofit organization based in Mountain
25:02View California it now has 12 full
25:05voting members I pay $18,000 a year just
25:08to vote on issues including like emoji
25:10and other kind of other members in
25:13so of those twelve nine are u.s.
25:16multinational tech companies Oracle IBM
25:18Google Yahoo Adobe Facebook Microsoft
25:21and Symantec then of the other three
25:24full voting members one is a German
25:27software company s ap another is the
25:29Chinese telecom company Huawei and the
25:31last is the government of Oman that's a
25:34really interesting crew isn't an
25:35interesting career and they have these
25:36quarterly meetings and then I just shot
25:38and they're you know very welcoming you
25:40know they're like you thank you for
25:41coming what brings you here tell us
25:44I felt like showing up at church like a
25:48new church you're a new member they all
25:49knew each other very well they're very
25:50excited that there's like someone you
25:52know young and like diverse so just like
25:53just like randomly showing up and so I
25:55in that process learn how you get emoji
25:58past and how they're regulated and so in
26:02January of 2016 we submitted a full
26:05proposal for dumplings takeout box
26:08chopsticks and fortune cookies and got
26:09those all passed so this will be in
26:11Unicode 10 which means that that that's
26:14announced in June of 2017 and so they'll
26:16actually hit your phones
26:17several months after that I was like wow
26:20billions of keyboards will be impacted
26:22by this that's amazing other proposal
26:25submitted at the time oh the constant
26:27proposals there's this whole process
26:28that people like Jenny some of them make
26:31it through some good useful bars
26:34actually for making sure quality
26:36yeah and the Unicode consortium has an
26:39amazing list of emoji criteria where
26:42they say okay here's what we're looking
26:43for for emoji it's got to have like you
26:45know kind of a unique meaning and that
26:48it's not covered by other stuff but it
26:49also should have like you know some
26:51ambiguity so it's not just like
26:53literally one thing it could be used in
26:54other contexts also there's one of the
26:56more interesting rules we're just no
26:58deities are out logos whoa the the
27:02Easter Island head is kind of a
27:03violation that one but that's got its
27:05own story a couple years ago with a big
27:07update the Easter Island head showed up
27:09in like the back of the Travel section
27:11of emoji and I was like what is that
27:13doing there who's traveling to Easter
27:15Island so often that they need to use
27:16these note emoji and it kind of just
27:18stuck in my mind and then I started
27:20using it in this kind of like slightly
27:21culturally insensitive way to like
27:23reference some supernatural phenomenon
27:26that I didn't understand right like if I
27:28was in a conversation with somebody and
27:29I was just like completely flummoxed I
27:30just like send that one your version of
27:31Bermuda Triangle just like who knows
27:34Stoneface other people use it for like
27:36stoned right like there's lots of
27:38combinations in there the reason why
27:39it's in there is that there's a statue
27:42in downtown Tokyo I think it's a Tabua
27:45station that is called moai which is a
27:47name of just like it's a proper noun of
27:49that statue which was made by an artist
27:52that was like a reference to original
27:55Easter Island head so it turns out
27:57Japanese teenagers use this Waypoint to
28:00meet each other and so that's how it
28:01ended up in Japanese cellphones and
28:04that's why it ended up an emoji the
28:05artists use this inspiration of Easter
28:07Island the interesting twist is that
28:08when you look at it on the iPhone it
28:10doesn't look anything like the statue in
28:12Tokyo at some point Apple was like not
28:14going to make it like this Tokyo one
28:18we're gonna do the original what Android
28:20on the other hand they're my emoji looks
28:23like the station one so fascinating I
28:26read a study I should include in our
28:27newsletter months ago of someone
28:29comparing how emojis look on different
28:31platforms and how it actually changes
28:33meeting okay you can actually think
28:35you're sending one thing and you get
28:36something else that's gonna happen in
28:38any system that has standardization like
28:40you're gonna try really hard to make
28:41sure people hue to the specification but
28:44you know people do their own
28:45implementations and things change in
28:47fact the whole reason why emoji
28:49are in unicode was because you would
28:51send your friend a emoji and then their
28:54cellphone would would actually just
28:56render the incorrect one it could be so
28:58much worse and the fact that there is a
29:00standard means that like you only get
29:01these like weird edge cases there's
29:03still some interesting messages of like
29:06the different telcos between Apple and
29:07Google one was DoCoMo and the other one
29:09was sopping sips also soft towel so
29:11they're basically depending on who their
29:13partner was locally they kind of
29:14inherited those generations of emojis
29:17for example on Apple women with money
29:20years is like two women dancing and kind
29:23of like a let's party kind of way with
29:24their bunny ears whereas on Android it's
29:27just the head shot of a woman with 20
29:28years and it's referencing this slightly
29:30misogynist part of Japanese culture of
29:32bunny woman which is itself a reference
29:34to the Playboy bunny and so like they
29:36were cocktail waitresses working in
29:38nightclubs that made its way into the
29:39Japanese and then so when it came over
29:42to America like I think Apple must been
29:43like let's make this a little more fun
29:45one of the easiest things actually to
29:46get emoji passes showing that a vendor
29:48uses it another argument is for
29:50completion this is actually why
29:52chopsticks got passed fairly easily
29:54because we had like knife and fork of
29:58the fan use completion so it doesn't
30:00tell the whole story like stringing
30:01together a bunch of you know I just
30:02think that it's like they're engineers
30:04you can't have ABCD and say you're
30:07actually one of the weird issues is that
30:09they're red yellow green purple blue
30:11hearts not orange so one of the big
30:14lobbying efforts has been to fill in the
30:16orange so the case of the Apple bunny
30:18ears and the Japanese bunny women that
30:20was a case where there was an
30:21intentional translation translation to
30:23sort of obscure the cultural reference
30:24smarter map technically the same emoji
30:28but it's like rendered and sort of
30:29interpreted differently they like emoji
30:31that can have multiple meanings you can
30:33also just have like emoji - have one
30:35meaning but it really has to be really
30:36good one was gonna be one meeting so for
30:39us the Chinese takeout box for example
30:41one of the arguments that we may we made
30:43is that it's it's one it's an iconic
30:45shape it also symbolizes both an entire
30:47cuisine which is Chinese food and also a
30:49means of eating which is delivery and
30:51take-out right and so so in that one
30:54symbol you get a lot of sort of
30:56secondary meaning and with fortune
30:58cookies like it's technically a cookie
31:00but it also means like mysterious in the
31:01future in the unknown
31:02like Solex or a primary secondary
31:04meaning one of the criteria for an emoji
31:06to get passed is that it has to have a
31:07certain element of ambiguity to it so
31:11much when I did emoji dick it was more
31:13of an experiment around crowdsourcing an
31:15emoji itself like I wasn't like so much
31:18interested in making a formal case that
31:21emoji could be a language because it was
31:22still so early could it get there maybe
31:25yeah but Unicode makes a really good
31:27point they're like emojis in our
31:29language it shouldn't be in the language
31:31the value is that it's ambiguous and
31:33I've really come around to that thinking
31:34in this idea that the charm of sending
31:37an emoji is that it can be interpreted
31:38in a couple different ways and and
31:40that's actually why we value it and I'll
31:42go further and say that a lot of people
31:44ask me why emoji have become so popular
31:45and I think it's tied to the fact that
31:47we now are just inundated with text we
31:51live in a text culture right we we
31:53communicate via text our careers are run
31:56over email we read constantly everything
31:59we do is mediated through almost literal
32:03words and so emoji represents this kind
32:06of reaction to that and the popularity
32:08of emoji I think is largely due to the
32:10fact that we need some other way of
32:11expressing ourselves over text if the
32:13pipes are so mechanical like phones and
32:16machine you no longer have the nonverbal
32:18aspect so this is actually replacing
32:20sort of this this human element of the
32:22glimmer in your eye or like the the
32:24cheeky the blush on your cheek there was
32:25an emoji that does that you think about
32:27the amount of signal you get from
32:28somebody's voice on an analog telephone
32:30and when you strip that out and all
32:32you're communicating is like lol you
32:34don't actually know how sincere that
32:36laugh is or that chuckle or whatever
32:38that person's trying to convey and so
32:40emoji gives us a much bigger palette to
32:42convey this kind of like extra like
32:44limbic meaning that we want to have in
32:46our in our communications but we we
32:48can't because we're just we're texting
32:50all the time so to breakdown the
32:51taxonomy of the girl representation not
32:53using literal text let's talk about
32:56we have emoticons which are like a colon
32:59and a parenthesis and that gives you a
33:00smiley face or like semicolon and a
33:03parenthesis that gives you a wink right
33:04using punctuation using situation is so
33:07often ASCII ish right art as well some
33:10of the earliest references to emoticons
33:12go back to the 19th century as well
33:13where people are using all
33:16and dashes and parentheses to express
33:18like a wink it goes way back it's
33:20important to add and higher glyphs and
33:22iconography other humans have had this
33:25idea the medium and the technology is
33:28kind of like incidental I'm so glad you
33:30brought that up because it's so
33:31important to not get caught up in
33:32technology time well technically
33:34technology includes like students and on
33:36stones so that does go back in time but
33:38in the context of this machine web that
33:40we live in then we have emoticons as
33:43part of the taxonomy and then we have
33:44emoji but how would you guys define
33:46emoji it's Japanese drawing language
33:48emoji I don't have grounds in Japanese
33:51but the Chinese the emo is not for
33:53emoticon or emotion or anything you're
33:55just totally coincidence whoa it's hard
33:58not to just huge at the Unicode standard
34:01and say it's the it's the set of icons
34:04defined in Unicode that represent
34:07objects and nouns and actions and the
34:11way that I explain it to people is an
34:12emoji is a character an emoji is
34:14something you can put in the subject
34:16line of an email because it literally is
34:18text so so in the same way that Unicode
34:20is kind of defined a standard to unify
34:23all the graphical representation of
34:25different languages throughout the world
34:27and even on languages so like you know
34:28the wingdings and all that kind of stuff
34:30emoji actually slip into that entire
34:32system so there is literally a what they
34:36would call a code point assigned to each
34:38emoji or sorry not every single one cuz
34:41now they're all a compound emoji but
34:42there are code points assigned to emoji
34:45which basically says you know when you
34:47when a computer sees this code point
34:49they render it in a certain way but that
34:52it's important to kind of wrap your head
34:54around what's actually happening inside
34:55the computer because the emoji is being
34:58sent as text if your computer supports
35:00utf-8 utf-16 that's just like a standard
35:03way for your computer to handle text
35:05whether it's your phone or your laptop
35:07then it's being told render this emoji
35:10but it's actually up to your computer's
35:11operating system whether it's OSX or iOS
35:13or Android or whatever to go fish out a
35:16little image and put it on your screen
35:18and so that image is actually controlled
35:20by the hardware manufacturer or the
35:22software manufacturer you know when it's
35:24actually rendered on your screen the the
35:26operating systems choosing which image
35:28to show you and those images are
35:30or you know in the same way that other
35:31images are stored in your computer as a
35:33little PNG files and so Apple you know
35:35puts those on your computer and your
35:36computer chooses to render those which
35:38is why you may get slightly different
35:43recently Facebook just introduced our
35:45own emoji and that like basically hijack
35:49Apple emoji so you can turn that on or
35:50off but essentially they they will
35:52replace swap out all the ones on the and
35:55Twitter's had their own set for a while
35:56and so why is that my guess is a lot of
36:01those companies are doing it because a
36:02they can afford to make their own set
36:04yeah be they want to avoid the legal
36:06liability of using Apple say and see
36:09like they think they might kind of have
36:11some like moment of like hey did you see
36:13Twitter's new emoji right and so there
36:15you know these large companies are kind
36:17of like re innovating and realist rating
36:21their emoji and I think you know I think
36:23Microsoft actually just evolved to a new
36:25center was an Android I think it might
36:27have been Google Android they they just
36:29upgraded to make it seem a little bit
36:31more normal like they had gone a
36:33terrible blue and yeah yeah and I think
36:38Google had blobby ones for a while now
36:39they're doing somewhat normal ones
36:41scariest emoji ever the Microsoft emoji
36:44are like blue and gray and they look
36:47like monsters that hide underneath your
36:49bed be like yellow zone part of the
36:56original emoji is you wanted things that
36:59were skin tone neutrals so Apple and
37:01Google chose yellow but Microsoft for
37:03some reason chose gray
37:05oh great cuz I'm gonna say for Hindu
37:07like blue is actually not a bad thing
37:08skin blue it's like a god the other
37:10thing is if you have your own set of
37:12emoji you can actually start adding to
37:14that set without going through the unit
37:16Unicode so like a very good example is
37:18the gay family emoji originally were
37:22they're not it's not actually one emoji
37:24know the ways like man man kid kid that
37:26is actually a compound emoji of four
37:29characters lewd together using something
37:32called a quote zero with Joyner which is
37:35basically invisible glue so if you are
37:38sending that emoji to someone else who
37:41doesn't have the ability to render it
37:43she unravels itself into like a multiple
37:45character now what you're seeing is a
37:47lot of vendors making compound emojis
37:50sound like actually one in the places
37:51where this is being debated for use is
37:53the need for a professional female emoji
37:55right because one of the big problems
37:56right now on the existing set of women
37:58as represented by emoji is like they're
38:01only like really for roles for women to
38:03play compared to men you know man you
38:05can be a sleuth or you can be a you know
38:07a police man you can be Santa Claus but
38:13as a woman the four thing is you can be
38:14as a role are basically bribed princess
38:19dancer Playboy bunny oh that's my god it
38:22just goes to show you how the Paulette
38:23and of course this is the politics of
38:25human life play out in these systems I
38:27mean the perfect example I was thinking
38:28of it's a rifle emoji and the case of I
38:31believe Apple Google and Facebook
38:33Charlie Wars L at BuzzFeed wrote a
38:35really detailed article investigating
38:36this and about how they sort of help
38:38suppress as part of the Unicode
38:40consortium the rifle emoji right emoji
38:42already has a gun in it right and it's
38:44like okay so how many more versions of
38:46that do we need and and and you're right
38:48it's it's absolutely a political topic I
38:49mean it manifested that that issue
38:50manifests itself in so many other places
38:52in emoji the country flags stuff is
38:54super interesting yeah because that uses
38:56kind of what Jenny's talking about with
38:58these compound emojis Unicode didn't
39:00actually want to decide which flags were
39:02and weren't in emojis dude amazing then
39:04political issues what they did was they
39:07built this kind of like meta country
39:09system so that you would actually be
39:11pairing these country letter emojis
39:13together so CNN would go together and
39:16then it would be up to your phone to
39:17decide if you showed the Chinese flag
39:20they pushed that decision making that
39:22like political decision making of which
39:24flags to support off to the handset
39:25manufacturer so Microsoft actually does
39:27something weird there but they do they
39:28they just show the they don't show a
39:31flag they show a few letters right
39:33Microsoft doesn't render it yeah to the
39:35point about politics being kind of
39:37embedded in emoji it's not just because
39:39these are icons that you know represent
39:42the parts of our lives that we feel
39:44passionate about it's because there's a
39:46finite palette it's not like language
39:48where you can only you know you can kind
39:49of combine say whatever the toriel you
39:51can take multiple combinations
39:54way more degrees of freedom to kind of
39:55practice yourself there's a finite
39:57number of food items that are ready to
39:59go in there and when you think about the
40:00vast like multitudes of humanity whether
40:02it's you know people's relationships as
40:04or sexual orientation or skin color it's
40:06like like emojis never going to be able
40:08to express that and so like how do you
40:10contain this thing that's like growing
40:13and kind of has to grow as more and more
40:15people use it but also by definition has
40:18to be a finite list of icons how do they
40:20handle the skin tone issue because one
40:22of the things that I noticed is that you
40:24an Apple because I use an Android so I
40:26didn't notice this you can press down on
40:27a thumbs up for example and then you can
40:30pick among 15 different shades to like
40:32pick a skin code shape that's closest to
40:34you it's amazing and it's Fitzpatrick
40:38yeah it's the same skin tone system that
40:42dermatologists used to categorize this
40:43remains a little bit of being a kid when
40:45like you had Crayola box I remember that
40:47the only shade you had there was like a
40:48nude shade or like a there's a great
40:56story about this in is gonna something
40:58weird for me to say but like women's
40:59pantyhose like his issue where dude was
41:01always considered Caucasian man and we
41:04were like this is ridiculous it was one
41:06of the earliest blind spots of emoji I
41:08remember I was like only white men
41:11designing them do you ever win slack
41:12there was this guy who wrote a post
41:14about and I remember it was so
41:17meaningful because it's such a minor
41:18seemingly arbitrary thing but then it is
41:21true like the first time I saw that I
41:24could find my skin colour in a system
41:26and to be able to use it was kind of
41:28amazing yeah and empowering and I think
41:31there's something significant about that
41:32I would totally agree I don't share your
41:34experience as a person on the other side
41:38and so it's funny for me because I don't
41:41he's a white male I don't share that
41:48like sense of identification with the
41:50bright white skin like it's it's it
41:56feels odd into that which speaks for my
42:00privilege as a white male girl just like
42:01that I mean if you're not exposed to
42:03you're not supposed to the bottom line
42:04is if you're any person of color you're
42:05always aware of your color right and so
42:07contact everyone else it's not the same
42:08color and so when I texted my friends
42:10who are not white and and I'm like
42:12should I be choosing that one and I
42:19often send for a mochi that's fabulous
42:29so now the kind of evolution is that we
42:31have yellow for like all the human face
42:33characters and then you can choose skin
42:35tones for some of them but it doesn't
42:36get at like more nuanced issues about
42:38like cultural and racial identity having
42:41to do with facial structure or hairstyle
42:43features like that's a great point I
42:45know because one of the pet peeves I
42:46have is when I used to go to foreign
42:47countries and look at billboards it
42:49always glorified that equity knows the
42:51face structure whereas there's a totally
42:53different type of face structure in
42:54different areas emoji probably won't
42:56ever have that amount of like
42:58customization and Unicode gets this and
43:01they'll they actually say like we're
43:03adding like 60 emoji a year this is
43:06unsustainable we feel like the future is
43:08in line images and that kind of breaks
43:10my heart as like kind of a you know nerd
43:13standardization guy who like who really
43:15appreciates all the hard work that went
43:17into unicode and and and the idea that
43:19it is a standard because if you're just
43:20sending inline images forever then like
43:23you know you have no idea what's gonna
43:25be on the other side if they can render
43:27the image stickers I mean it's soaked
43:29emoji emoji it's not actually emoji
43:34these are just stickers or images that
43:36you can text back and forth but you know
43:38again you know standards can you put it
43:40in the subject line in the email and
43:41those you can't you can't so therefore
43:43they don't qualify right so then going
43:46back to our hierarchy we went from the
43:48emoticon to emoji and now stickers
43:49stickers stickers are just images so you
43:53can pick from a palette like I think you
43:55can you know in certain apps you can
43:56like apply a sticker to an image that
43:59it's like sits on top of it but you're
44:00then in this kind of like proprietary
44:02ecosystem of that's okay but like you
44:04think about the stuff that really works
44:06and the stuff that really changes the
44:10future or the web and communication is
44:12it's all standardized the
44:14standardization person because my friend
44:15Connie who wrote a wonderful post on the
44:18topic of stickers argues that emoji are
44:21for what you need to do because she
44:23feels that that you have so much more
44:24expression and the ability to convey so
44:26much more with stickers than you do with
44:28emoji emoji doesn't preclude the use of
44:30stickers there is some subset of images
44:33that are universal enough that should be
44:36hardwired into the operating systems and
44:39anter basically can be cross-platform
44:41that an iOS device can talk to you know
44:45Microsoft Windows and can write to like
44:48an Android device can talk to you your
44:49Mac laptop like the fact that at least
44:51area there is you're not gonna get
44:52little square boxes as long as your
44:54operating systems are fairly up to date
44:56well that goes in the near point about
44:57the why standardization is important
44:59because you're now giving up that you're
45:01in this proprietary ecosystem like
45:02WeChat or line and you only have their
45:04sticker set you don't you can't always
45:05transfer all these stickers across I
45:07mean also if you think about the
45:08accessibility issues around stickers
45:10right like people using screen readers
45:12they're not going to be able to
45:12interpret an image and like emoji
45:14actually have names and so in theory
45:16there's much better accessibility for
45:18emoji for somebody who's visually
45:20impaired so like for example last year
45:24Oxford English Dictionary chose very sad
45:31only its you know the thing with the
45:34eyes and it's like bawling but that's
45:36actually face of tears of joy and that
45:38is how you know that because you know
45:39all these emojis they say the label
45:41Oxford put that in there word of the
45:44year was an emoji the reason they they
45:46chose that was that it ended up as
45:48number one on my friend site called
45:49emoji tracker comm oh right that's right
45:51the emoji tracker which tracked all the
45:52use of emoji and for a while it was just
45:54like it was like the heart emoji or
45:56something or just the smiling face emoji
45:58so I think it's really interesting when
45:59when the top emoji shuffle because you
46:02know when whenever you start texting
46:04with somebody who hasn't used emoji
46:05before they're like choosing like the
46:07safest ones going back to this idea of
46:10some of the companies owning their own
46:12emoji and some of the proprietary open
46:15tension between standardization freedom
46:17of expression what do you make of this
46:19notion that part of what we're doing
46:20here is essentially also creating a more
46:22machine readable web in terms of
46:24emotional reading because essentially
46:26you're now adding a whole new layer
46:27where you can codify people's emotions
46:30sentiment in ways beyond just a black
46:32and white like don't like I've been
46:33thinking about this so much actually
46:35and not in the context of emoji but
46:37actually Facebook reactions yeah me too
46:39I used to assign and edit beds on this
46:41topic it's a really interesting topic
46:43because if you look at traditional
46:45sentiment analysis in the data world
46:47it's kind of a joke you have to have
46:49training data you have to know good
46:50cases and write and interject for a
46:53moment as someone who has been tested
46:54tested a million of those systems and
46:55can never find one that actually works
46:57for my knee needs there's a binary you
47:00don't get anything useful you're not
47:01getting insights one of the reasons
47:02there is that words have these degrees
47:05of freedom they can use they can be
47:07sarcastically and you would never know
47:09it based on the semantics and so
47:10traditional sentiment analysis is really
47:13broken because you're using these these
47:16kind of like stale rigid semantic
47:18definitions what's really interesting
47:19about Facebook reactions is you know you
47:22think you're saying I love this thing or
47:24I'm sad about this or I'm angry about
47:26this what we're actually doing in
47:28conjunction with that is giving Facebook
47:31really great labeled data for sentiment
47:33analysis that's right machine readable
47:36data that is a holy grail of emotional
47:40sentiment understanding when I was at
47:42Wired I assigned a piece to a
47:44sociologist Evan Salinger because I
47:47wanted to coin this phrase the mood
47:48graph because we have an interest graph
47:50social graph you know you know all kinds
47:52of other graphs that link all these
47:53nodes and ideas and now to have like a
47:56mood graph to essentially be able to put
47:57your pulse on someone's mood something
47:59very finite yet constantly changing it's
48:01just a fascinating thing to be able to
48:02codify this the sentiments have
48:05generally correlational wrong with human
48:07face and body so I think this is also
48:09why people agitate so much for emoji
48:13that looks like themselves like the
48:14redheads and people with beers and
48:16people you know who are who have like
48:17poor bald or anyone has curly hair
48:19people with curly air
48:20relate to other people here and so I
48:22think people really love seeing
48:25themselves represented in moji which is
48:26why bitmoji which is highly highly
48:28highly customized stickers in sort of
48:31emoji spirit oh and my cousins and these
48:32bitmoji and what's up all the time I
48:34think there's something really
48:35symbolically important about bitmoji
48:37because you are putting yourself in it
48:40and conveying in this sticker form the
48:42fact that snapchat bought it I think is
48:44really telling right especially given
48:47that they are changing this culture of
48:49you express yourself through your facial
48:50expressions with face swapping and
48:52filters Connie and I made the argument
48:53that it's sort of like selfies as
48:55selfies as a form of stickers so what
48:57we're talking about the machine-readable
48:58is a little distinct than this but it's
49:01sort of an interesting idea I also think
49:02it ties into this slightly dubious
49:04notion of the uncanny valley where you
49:06want to try to represent yourself and
49:08you want to have like configurability or
49:09on that it needs to be kind of
49:11cartoonish for it to be believable I
49:13think what we're seeing with snapchat
49:15filters and I mean he doesn't played
49:16with snow yet that's like a no snapchat
49:19filters and just multiplying by a
49:20thousand it's like names like just like
49:22amazing amounts of diversity around the
49:24amount of stuff you can put on your it's
49:27it's it is this weird convergence on
49:29identity and an emoji that's kind of
49:32happening I I agree and in fact this is
49:34gonna be a little sounding like a little
49:35uh out of left field for a moment but
49:37the whole notion around the Chewbacca
49:40when you know that was a most popular
49:41Facebook live video ever it got like
49:43unprecedented views and there was simply
49:44a woman who was trying on her Chewbacca
49:46masks in the car and she's laughing and
49:48giggling about it and she puts her mask
49:49on and then she takes it off and she
49:51laughs so uninhibitedly
49:54it's insane and I make the argument that
49:56what was so empowering cuz it was
49:58totally took off for obvious reasons
50:00is not the fact that she was laughing so
50:02uninhibitedly it's a fact that it took
50:04putting on and then taking off the mask
50:06for her to do that which is a lot not
50:09unlike what happens with communication
50:11through these filters and being able to
50:12now express yourself through these
50:13cartoon like ways I mean it takes me
50:16back to like theater and like
50:18Shakespeare and like seven in the 8th
50:19grade I remember having these like
50:21really intense discussions about like
50:22what it is to put on a mask yeah mask
50:25represents the Joseph Campbell like math
50:28or admit and the man yeah you're right
50:29there's a theater I mean that's why
50:30people say improv is so interesting it
50:32for any career field but I think that
50:33there is an interesting moment now
50:35coming together with selfie stickers
50:37emoji bitmoji x' altogether where we do
50:40have this new emotional web coming
50:42together and using emoji as the first
50:44time I thought about this could be kind
50:46of like putting on a mask over your you
50:49know self - yeah oh your words to convey
50:51to yourself this like this extra this
50:54this kind of additional layer this
50:56emphasis of your emotion that you
50:58otherwise might not get okay so going
51:00back to you writing an entire book in
51:02and yet you're saying that you've kind
51:03of evolved into thinking that you know
51:05that emoji is not necessarily language
51:07but clearly it is a visual language and
51:09it is a tool for communication it's not
51:10complete so how did you translate that
51:12and weird some of the trade-offs and
51:14decisions you made and by the way for
51:16the audience that book was like 2009 or
51:18that was like many years ago so I got in
51:24a text from my college roommate whose
51:26wife is Japanese he sent me an emoji and
51:28I was like what is that they told me you
51:30could download like a basically a
51:32Japanese app and we'd like awaken your
51:34iPhone to the emoji keyboard but like
51:39you have to hack the iPhone to get this
51:41special keyboard of like Japanese icons
51:43and I was like oh my god I want this so
51:44bad I was like this is amazing I should
51:47write a book in emoji and I was like
51:49that's a lot of work and I know if I
51:50could write a whole book moji and then I
51:52was like well maybe I can translate a
51:53book and I melodia I was like okay what
51:55books would work and I was like well it
51:56has to be in the public domain because I
51:58worked alone and like the copyright
52:00reform space nobody it would just like
52:01let me translate their book into emoji
52:03without a lot of effort for a moment I
52:05thought about the Bible and I was like
52:06that's too obvious what's like what's
52:08like totally even more inappropriate the
52:10movie dick games yeah they came to mind
52:12I was like this this like impossible
52:14book to trans to put into these symbolic
52:17characters as soon as I thought I was
52:18like no I can't do that that's crazy I
52:20was like that's like too hard honestly
52:21it's a little bit like I just came back
52:22from seeing Hamilton and so it's a
52:23little bit like the idea of putting a
52:24wrap to like the founding fathers and
52:31and and it's it's like one of those
52:33things where you told to somebody and
52:35they're like you can't do that that's
52:36crazy and then you're like well the fact
52:37that you just said that made me want to
52:38do and so well I thought there are not
52:40one but two whale emoji where they're at
52:43that no there's only the original the
52:46cute one I think it's called sperm whale
52:54didn't come until later so I was like
52:56okay wow that would be really
52:58interesting to do all Moby Dick because
53:00it's also like really long I mean it's
53:0110,000 sentences and okay well if I
53:04don't want to do this man hire somebody
53:05to do this and I was like experimenting
53:07with Mechanical Turk at the same time I
53:09think it was like one of the original
53:11Amazon Web Services it was like it would
53:13later become you know
53:15that awsm people using it for research
53:18and right it's a still used for research
53:20it's still being valuable for that but
53:22you know a couple other people had done
53:23like an experiment here they're like
53:25using it like off-label I had made a
53:28task of Mechanical Turk just to ask Turk
53:31workers if you could ask anyone like to
53:33do anything on Mechanical Turk what
53:35would you have them do and they came up
53:36with this long list of stuff and I don't
53:37think translate a book into a mode you
53:38was one of them but there's some
53:39creativity out there I was like okay I'm
53:41gonna I'm gonna try this thing we're
53:43gonna hire people to translate moby dick
53:45into emoji some portion of it and see if
53:47this works so I did the first chapter
53:49and the results came back and they were
53:50hilarious they're so good what did they
53:54what do you mean you did the first
53:55chapter like did they break it down word
53:56by word so how you captured emojis on a
54:01per sentence basis and that actually
54:03turned out to be one of the challenging
54:05parts of the project was like splicing
54:07sentences is actually look kind of like
54:08a classically hard and a natural
54:10language processing problem right and so
54:12I kind of like figured out a hack to
54:13like chop it up and I wrote a lot of
54:15regular expressions to basically well
54:16book into sentence but you decided
54:18basically this sentence was a unit of
54:19analysis can you say pick any of these
54:23emoji and then actually wrote my own
54:24little emoji picker because no these
54:26things didn't exist at the time I had
54:28gotten the emoji from a friend he had
54:30reverse engineered the iPhone SDK and
54:33basically hacked out the PNG files from
54:36the software kit to basically have the
54:39raw emoji in image form and so I took
54:41that and just made like a little
54:42JavaScript like HTML thing and it's you
54:44know dump that into Mechanical Turk and
54:46like came back and I was like hey this
54:47works and so I think the the the
54:50sentence that's kind of like on the
54:51cover of the book if you go to the
54:53website it's like being emoji dick emoji
54:55dick Tom call me Ishmael is the first
54:58sentence of Moby Dick and the the emoji
55:01that the Turk worker chose was like a
55:04telephone man with face sailboat whale
55:07emoji the rest of it was just like
55:11indecipherable emoji nonsense and some
55:13of the people were just like all right
55:15give me my five cents I'm gonna click
55:16some random emoji I know other people
55:17just like click every single emoji so
55:19the plan became have people translate
55:22the same sentence multiple times so you
55:25get three different emoji translations
55:27for one sentence and
55:28and have another set of tasks where
55:30people vote on the best most appropriate
55:33translation so like of the three which
55:35one got the meaning across the best and
55:38I was like it's just like getting really
55:39excited about this I started doing the
55:40math and how much it was gonna cost and
55:42I was like a scary thousand thousand
55:44that summer I met the Kickstarter guys I
55:46started talking with Andy Baio
55:47he was like you put on Kickstarter so
55:49that night I went home and put it on
55:50Kickstarter Louis did the next day and
55:52ended up working for them and the the
55:55campaign animator the camp I my goal was
55:57like 3,500 and raising 3700 so I worked
56:00on it for you know nights and weekends
56:01for another like eight or nine months
56:03and then you know I'll published it on
56:05lulu.com you can still buy it gets
56:06printed on demand and you know still buy
56:09I've sold like thousands of dollars of
56:11emoji deck and and I see hundreds of
56:15copy and probably like 5 or 600 copies
56:18of it have sold since then which there
56:24are two copies one there's a black and
56:26white copy which is like the easy to
56:28print one and that's like 20 or 30
56:30dollars and then there's the full-color
56:32one which like is obviously preferable
56:34because emojis are colorful but when
56:37you're printing on to man 800 pages of
56:39color laser hard bound copy it's
56:42actually really expensive so that thing
56:44cost like $180 because you're not
56:46actually save money wasn't involved I
56:49have to sell that one for that much and
56:51like he must still buy it
56:52in 2013 the library Congress contacted
56:54me and they you know they said we would
56:57like to acquire emoji dick as our first
56:58emoji but I was like are you sure oh
57:01yeah yeah we're sure I was telling a
57:03friend and David Gallagher you must know
57:06from The Times and he's like you know
57:08everyone submits their stuff to little
57:10Ivor Congress it's not that big of a
57:11deal and I was like no man they asked
57:13for it like they're requiring of you
57:16they're saying we're this is a cultural
57:18moment it's not just a book that was
57:20published yeah and we need to figure out
57:21how to acquire it I was like alright
57:23I'll spare a coffee I signed it I sent
57:25it to them and then they sent me this
57:26little like you know certificate in
57:28digital form and was hilarious and this
57:30is my favorite part is that it's somehow
57:32listed as a translation of Moby Dick so
57:34when you look up emoji dick it says all
57:36these libraries have it because it's
57:38really just saying that like they have a
57:39translation they have the original
57:41we dick now it's got a life of its own
57:42and people I mean you actually been
57:45cured in an art show friends of mine put
57:48together a kind of emoji survey art show
57:52and there are some really good stuff in
57:54there emoji tracker was there there was
57:55a programming language built out of
57:57emoji there's a URL I mean that's
58:00nothing they're literally text so you
58:02can have like emoji at well I don't know
58:04but you can of emoji in your email
58:06address yeah you can so you have an
58:09emoji book you have emoji art shows and
58:12what you hack it on emoji hackathon so
58:14our big news this week is that in
58:17November in San Francisco we are going
58:19to throw the first ever emoji con which
58:21is it's like comic-con but emoji I
58:24really show up trust in you guys are
58:28gonna show up at the dumpling um yeah
58:30for sure or like you know poop emoji or
58:32like the ghost emoji so it has many
58:34different elements to it so one is
58:36definitely sort of this whole emoji
58:37learn aspect where it's like panels and
58:40talks and there's a sort of emoji Film
58:42Festival and then there's an emoji
58:43hackathon and then there's an emoji art
58:45show and then of course the opening
58:47party emoji where you know our goals
58:49only have food it is also also a Mosel
58:51why a conference I mean of course I see
58:53the cultural significance but to bring
58:55people together around this first this
58:57idea of a first-ever emoji con like what
58:59significance of those I thought it
59:00already existed and to me that was like
59:04yeah and then I was like the fact it
59:06didn't exist and I kind of have this
59:08issue or of like I thinks I mean
59:09something needs to be right so we did I
59:13with dumpling emoji we did with emoji
59:14continent so we actually have some
59:15really cool sponsors we're gonna have a
59:17lot of kind of emoji activists kind of
59:20energy activist you know from our
59:22perspective you know there are a lot of
59:24policy decisions around emoji and
59:26obviously the world really cares about
59:27emoji whether or not they're by full
59:29emoji or the condom emoji or like
59:30professional woman emoji part of the
59:32goal of emoticons to open up that
59:34discussion so it is not just how that
59:35the unicode level so to start your new
59:38code members gonna be attending members
59:39of a unicode emoji subcommittee
59:41including like you know the co-chairs
59:42and we've hind it in November
59:44between the Unicode conference itself
59:47and the Unicode Technical Committee
59:49meeting and also like it's right around
59:51election day well you guys thank you for
59:55this is so much fun this is so much fun
59:57so much fun I could get over hours and
59:59hours under me yeah I wish we could
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