Daniel Utz

“Beyond Unicode – Emoji and other signs”

When developing our open source emoji system ‘OpenMoji’ we adhered to the generally binding standard: Unicode. Although there are lots of emoji (many of them in different versions), we soon reached the limits of the system. Many basic things are missing: Unicode defines a ‘Bottle with Popping Cork’ (U+1F37E) or a ‘Baby Bottle’ (U+1F37C). But there is no universal, generic bottle. Let alone any abstract vessel or container. Things get even more difficult when you leave the area of emoji and look for icons or symbols. These are distributed across many different Unicode Blocks and their sorting is often erratic.

This leads us to the following theses and questions:

• A distinction between emoji, icons and symbols is actually pointless, as the transitions between the categories are fluid. How could a practical database be structured that represents different icons equally?

• A generally valid classification of characters is not possible. Which alternative categories, tags and sorting options would make sense?

• How detailed should individual characters be presented: short description, basic graphic elements included, history, usage, variants, related characters, ...

• What should the platform contain? Just a character catalogue with descriptions? Generic vector outlines? Examples from different design systems?

• Who would be interested in such a platform? Communication, interface or information designers? Normal people? Which features would be important for different user groups?

• In which directions could such a platform evolve? Unicode, Wikipedia or something completely different?

Biography
Daniel Utz is a professor in the Communication Design programme at the HfG Schwäbisch Gmünd. His teaching focus is on typography, information design and visual identity systems. Together with his colleague Benedikt Groß, many students and external collaborators he developed the Open Source Emoji System ‘OpenMoji’. As an independent designer he mainly works on sign systems: Pictograms and icons, but also letters and typefaces, such as the font ‘Netto’ (now available at TypeMates).
https://openmoji.org/ 
https://www.typemates.com/fonts/netto-and-icons
http://danielutz.de/ 
https://e.ensad-nancy.eu/collection/rencontre-du-troisieme-type-ecrire-avec-des-images/daniel-utz/