Emojis? They're more than just a smiley face

Who knew, until it was published in China Daily and other media outlets this week, that there is an international nonprofit agency that zealously maintains global standards for emojis?

The Unicode Consortium, which develops international standards for text and symbols used in software for computer devices and mobile phones, has just announced 67 more of the pesky little pictograms for adoption next year.

Popularized by the Japanese from the early 2000s, emojis - from the Japanese for picture and character - started off with the "smiley face/sad face" combo with which even the most out of touch computer illiterate is now familiar. Since then emojis have evolved into a vast character set of symbols for every occasion that is now almost as extensive as an actual language.