Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 6
Posts 1 - 6

«In Japan steht für Danke, im Westen für Beten»

("In Japan it means thank you, in the West it signals praying")

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Newspaper | Sonntagszeitung
Date | 20.8.2017
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | emojis, marketing, misunderstanding, research/study, texting, translation
Summary | Keith Broni, one of the first emoji translators world-wide, has been chosen from 500 applicants. He has researched the use of emojis at the University of London and he is an expert of how people from different cultures understand emojis. He works as a makerting consultant to various companies and advises them on how to use emojis as a corporation. Using emojis can be fraught with risk as hand gestures can mean very different things in different cultures. Even within the same culture emoji use can be risky. At this point, it is more risky not to use any emojis in casual texting because of the negativity effect which means that messsages without emojis seem cold or distanced.
Image Description | N/A

Der Herr der Smileys

(The Lord of Smileys)

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Newspaper | Tages-Anzeiger
Date | 29.7.2017
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | computer programming, emojis, misunderstanding, translation
Summary | The Unicode chief, Mark Davis, assesses which new emojis make it into the Unicode which all major tech firms use. Anyone can propose an emoji but they have to argue why it is a globally significant symbol. They are then written into the Unicode which is a computer code that works for all languages. Tech firms then choose the font for the letters and emojis in which these symbols appear on their devices. Tech companies have chosen more similar emoji fonts over the last years to avoid misunderstandings between devices of different providers if the emojis are displayed differently.
Image Description | Portrait of the interviewee Mark Davis.
Image Tags | male(s)

Crackdown on Online Criticism Chills Pakistani Social Media

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 27.7.2017
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | censorship, law, misunderstanding, social media, threat
Summary | The Pakistani government has passed a very strict law that prohibits any anti-government or anti-army posts on social media. Some people have already been arrested. They claim that their posts were not criticizing the armed forces and that it was all a misunderstanding. This is a huge issie when people get arrested for trivial tweets.
Image Description | Getty image of a protest.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), text

Planning a Trip With the Help of Google Home

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 31.5.2017
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, Google, misunderstanding, smartphone, translation
Summary | Google's artificial intelligence assistant is getting better every day. It is available on all Android smartphones and on the home speaker. It can find out web search queries, translate phrases, and help book a flight by keeping one updated about changing flight fares. Sometimes one however has to adjust one's syntax so that the AI assistant will correctly decode one's request.
Image Description | The Google home personal (AI) assistant speaker.
Image Tags | Google

Entreprise cherche traducteur parlant couramment l'emoji

(Company looking for a translator speaking emoji)

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Newspaper | Le Monde
Date | 14.12.2016
Language | French
Country | France
Topic Tags | emojis, misunderstanding, translation
Summary | A translation company based in London (Today Translation) is looking for a an emoji translator. The translator will have to understand and explain misunderstandings related to emoji communication, and establish "trends". Emojis are now as common as numbers and letters. However, they do not mean the same thing everywhere. For example, the BBC claims that the "goodbye emoji" can simply mean "goodbye" in English or French, but in China, it means "you are no longer my friend". Is emoji a new language? Even if they express emotion, they can't be called a language.
Image Description | N/A

«Traducteur d'emojis», un poste rare recherché à Londres

("Emoji translator", a rare job wanted in London)

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Newspaper | Le Figaro
Date | 15.12.2016
Language | French
Country | France
Topic Tags | emojis, misunderstanding, translation
Summary | Using emojis can lead to misunderstandings. Today Translation (based in London) is looking for an emoji translator. The employee would need to decipher and explain misunderstandings related to the use of emojis. This is a very serious job offer. Since people are using more and more emojis in their digital conversations, and since the meaning of emojis is not unversal, there is a real need for emoji translation.
Image Description | N/A

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