Android keyboard warriors get your trigger fingers ready — the middle finger emoji is coming to a handset near you.
Actually, it can't come soon enough since Google hasn't even set a release date yet for its new set of emoji on its mobile operating system. (They say it's coming but don't say when? Middle finger emoji here.)
Apple, as always, gets all the cool stuff first. In its latest iOS 9.1 update, its users get to enjoy the newest emoji from the freshest Unicode update (8.0), which includes goodies like tacos and unicorns. In fact, Apple allows its users access to all the emoji ever created dating all the way back to Unicode 1.1 from 1993. Android users, on the other hand, are still waiting to get their hands on the Unicode 7.0 updates, which include different skin colored hands.
Access to emoji may seem like a trivial thing to rant about, yes. But what happens when emoji become a cultural norm for communicating and a large number of people aren't able to participate in the dialogue because they can't even see what's going in the conversation?
If, for example, an iOS user sends an Android user an emoji of a taco, all the Android user will see is an empty box. On a larger scale, if an iOS user tweets a series of emoji of tacos, burritos, unicorns and middle fingers in varying shades of skin color, an Android user will keep seeing nothing but empty boxes.
Android users' rants have been heard, at last. Google's senior vice president for Android recently tweeted about new emoji's coming to Android. In his tweet, Hiroshi Lockheimer: 1) Is thankful for the feedback, 2) Is on it, and 3) Is sorry. Thumbs up to that (which Android users actually have as an emoji.)
So I have a feeling y'all want new emojis? a) Thanks for the feedback, b) We're on it, and c) Sorry!
— Hiroshi Lockheimer (@lockheimer) October 23, 2015
As we've previously stated above, there is no definite date of the rollout of unicorn emoji et al for Android. It would've been a great addition to its recent release of Android 6.0 Marshmallow, but it looks like it'll take a while longer.
Historically, updates on the OS trickle down to non-Nexus devices at a snail pace, if at all. By the time Android users do finally get the latest Unicode update, they could still find themselves behind as Unicode 9.0 is expected to arrive mid-2016. Thumbs down, Google.
Photo: JD Hancock | Flickr
