a11yTOConf2020

Uncover The Hidden Challenges Of Using Emoji

Speaker: Rachel Menzes
Twitter: @Rachel_Menzies Slides

Many people has fun sending emojis, but they can cause confusion. Example: heart + smile face
Emojis have Unicode Charaters
- face-smiling
- Face with tires of joy
Rendering of Unicode Characters are different depending on the device (Android, IOs, web)
Brown Bear + Snowflake: works in Android but in other cases it doesn’t
Alternative use for emoji: peach, octupus, egg plant
Screen readers wont be able to interpret if multiple emojis using together
There’s no autocorrect for Emojis
Sometimes if you tap on the wrong emoji, Things might get weird
Using emojis on profile names can derive in weird interpretations for screen reader. Ex: happy face, smile face, Rachel
Poor use in Context. Ex warning #waterloo information sound alert CWR Customer …
https://twitter.com/networkrail?lang=en
Consider when using emojis.
Consider the number of emojis you’re going to use
Six emojis with tears is more impactful for visual users, but for screen readers it’s too repetitive
Placement of Emoji. In user name might just be decorative
Distracting if use at the beginning of a phrase
Consideration of Reader, following image is complete inaccessible. It describes a road using emoji. This can’t be interpreted by Screen Readers
Emoji can be missing if using an old device, or including new emojis not supported in every device.

Full paper from CHI 2020 is at http://eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/33854/1/tigwell-gorman-menzies-CHI2020.pdf
http://unicode.org/emoji/charts/full-emoji-list.html