<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 9/15/2021 11:39 AM, Mark E. Shoulson
via Unicode wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:1970249a-317f-5d38-bda4-9e7a30a84ff5@shoulson.com">Emoji
come up a lot in these discussions, because they represent a break
from the original goal of Unicode to encode things that are in
use, not things that might be used. And okay, that is a big
break, but to be fair, emoji are kind of a special case, and it
isn't right to try to infer from emoji to other situations. </blockquote>
<p>When you try to generalize, generalize to like situation. Doing
that may require treating different writing systems consistently
based on their type.<br>
</p>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:1970249a-317f-5d38-bda4-9e7a30a84ff5@shoulson.com">In
some sense, "emoji" as a whole have vast demonstrated usage, and
encoding a new character among them is not the same as encoding a
script or writing system that has yet to show usage. </blockquote>
<p>It's a writing system that has global reach (even if not
"high-brow") and is actively, you could even say enthusiastically,
supported by systems/font vendors (and users). <br>
</p>
<p>Unlike similar systems that represent unbounded collections it
has evolved mechanisms for introducing novel items that will
available on equal terms to established items (in the real world,
not just in the standard).<br>
</p>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:1970249a-317f-5d38-bda4-9e7a30a84ff5@shoulson.com">It's
more like encoding a brand-new character in the IPA that hasn't
seen use yet, but we know people use the IPA and so this letter
will be used. (I know, the parallel isn't perfect: an IPA
character would have been approved by the IPA, etc. Try to see
the forest for the trees.)
<br>
</blockquote>
<p>When it comes to new items, mathematical symbols may be more
similar. Because of existing, parallel technologies, like TeX,
it's possible for that notation to innovate in advance of
standardizing by Unicode. However, de-facto, the collection is
unbounded and actively being added to. Not all fields of
mathematics will ever expand with equal popularity; so there's a
similar issue with additions not equally guaranteed to be of the
same importance/ popularity/longevity.</p>
<p>When it comes to immediate support, currency symbols come to
mind. They form an unbounded set of their own, with active
innovation happening, but users not really having a choice whether
or not to use a new symbol (the only thing is that the currency
could fail and all usage to become historical).<br>
</p>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:1970249a-317f-5d38-bda4-9e7a30a84ff5@shoulson.com">
<br>
So, yeah, emoji are weird, but I don't think they can be
generalized.
</blockquote>
<p>They fit the intersection between pictographic writing systems
with unbounded collection and writing systems (symbol collections)
with active innovation. <br>
</p>
<p>To the extent that no other system shows just that combination of
trends you can't derive any parallels; on the other hand, they
have a define place in any Venn diagram of writing systems.</p>
<p>A./<br>
</p>
</body>
</html>