Emoji are showing up as evidence in court more frequently

Emoji have really filled a gap, where words typed on the internet were missing some context of how they are supposed to be read. And nowadays, whether or not I add the eggplant emoji to the end of a whatsapp message can really change how it&#x27;s interpreted, and gives me less to excuse myself should it come up in court.<p>But really, anything that removes doubt and clarity from a conversation has got to be a good thing. How many internet arguments have been spared because someone could attach a winky face to show that they were being impish and not to take offence? Obviously, old people hate them, but I can see emoji melding into all forms of language in the future. Or even the global language :thinking-face:

&gt; Despite the potential for emoji to be interpreted in a wide array of ways, emoji experts don’t really exist. “Emoji usually have dialects. They draw meaning from their context. You could absolutely talk about emoji as a phenomenon, but as for what a particular emoji means, you probably wouldn’t go to a linguist. You would probably go to someone who’s familiar with that community, just like they did with the sex trafficking case,” Goldman says.<p>What does Goldman think linguists do when they research the meaning of words?

&gt; <i>After sending an enthusiastic text confirming that they wanted the apartment,</i><p>Anyone who sends little yellow men as part of a business conversation deserves whatever misfortune befalls them.<p>Anyone who conducts a business conversation over any medium but snail mail, fax, email or the phone deserves whatever misfortune befalls them.<p>I know this is old-fashioned, but business is business, personal is personal.

It should always be taken with a grain of salt; I guess you can make sweeping statements like &quot;positive&#x2F;negative tone&quot;, but you should be careful attributing exact meanings to it. I mean to some, an eggplant is an eggplant, to others it&#x27;s a penis. There will be community specific meanings attributed to certain emoji, often unspoken or even unaware.

I frequently use the greening teeth emoji on my iPhone as a negative. Now I know that my Android addressees interpret this as positive.

My friend went bankrupt and a bunch of us had loaned him a little money as a stop gap, and he submitted our Facebook messages as screenshots as proof of the debt he owed us.