• Home
  • Latest
  • Fortune 500
  • Finance
  • Tech
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia

Trendingnow

1

After forcing workers back to the office, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are now letting their staff work remotely—but only for the World Cup

2

Markets tumble worldwide as Fed resets expectations: $400 billion wiped off SpaceX stock

3

Current price of oil as of June 23, 2026

1

After forcing workers back to the office, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are now letting their staff work remotely—but only for the World Cup

2

Markets tumble worldwide as Fed resets expectations: $400 billion wiped off SpaceX stock

3

Current price of oil as of June 23, 2026
TechraceAhead

Google and Emoji Authorities Put Gender Equality on the Fast Track

By
David Meyer
David Meyer
Down Arrow Button Icon
By
David Meyer
David Meyer
Down Arrow Button Icon
July 15, 2016, 9:54 AM ET
Add Fortune on Google for similar content.

When a quartet of Google employees recently pushed for emojis to become less male-centric, the organization in charge of authorizing the handy characters took notice.

The Unicode Consortium said on Thursday that it would shake things up with urgency. Until now, many emoji have been depicted as men—police officers, for example—while the female characters have been highly stereotyped in other roles, such as hairdressers.

By the end of this year, there will be 11 professions with new emoji for both men and women across a variety of skin tones. These include farmers, welders, mechanics, health workers, scientists, coders, business workers, chefs, students, teachers, and rock stars.

Get Data Sheet, Fortune’s technology newsletter.

On top of those emoji, which Google (GOOG) proposed a few months ago, new versions will become available for 33 existing emoji that currently portray only a man or a woman, such as runners and cops.

The Unicode Consortium is a non-profit organization comprised of members from the various companies that may end up incorporating emoji into their products, such as Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT), IBM (IBM), and Google. Unicode standardizes the strings of characters that various messaging apps and computer programs turn into little pictures so that an emoji created in one app will still mean the same thing when it shows up in another.

While it has been working on completing “gender pairs” for some time (for example, adding a prince option to a princess), the Consortium tends to work quite slowly. The next set of new additions to be included in Unicode 10.0 isn’t scheduled to be finalized until the fourth quarter of this year and then rolled out in June 2017.

Thus, to push gender-balanced emoji out to the masses more quickly, the Consortium decided to use a mechanism that combines existing emoji into new pictures rather than creating entirely new emoji. The same mechanism is already used to display diverse family groupings, for example.

For more on emoji, watch our video.

That means the makers of your favorite messaging apps could start designing new female and male welders, surfers, and so on, and then roll them out by the end of 2016.

“We hope these updates help make emoji just a little more representative of the millions of people around the [world] who use them,” wrote Nicole Bleuel, marketing lead and diversity champion for Google’s Emoji team in a blog post on Friday. And instead of writing out “world,” Bleuel used its emoji representation instead.

About the Author
By David Meyer
LinkedIn icon
See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon
Add Fortune on Google for similar content.

Latest in Tech

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025

Most Popular

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Fortune Secondary Logo
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • World's Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
  • Lists Calendar
Sections
  • Finance
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Features
  • Leadership
  • Health
  • Commentary
  • Success
  • Retail
  • Mpw
  • Tech
  • Lifestyle
  • CEO Initiative
  • Asia
  • Politics
  • Conferences
  • Europe
  • Newsletters
  • Personal Finance
  • Environment
  • Magazine
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
  • Group Subscriptions
About Us
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • Facebook icon
  • Twitter icon
  • LinkedIn icon
  • Instagram icon
  • Pinterest icon

Latest in Tech

Tesla cofounder JB Straubel’s first pitch to Elon Musk failed. Then he turned his ‘hobby’ into a $1.3 trillion success
SuccessBrainstorm Tech
Tesla cofounder JB Straubel’s first pitch to Elon Musk failed. Then he turned his ‘hobby’ into a $1.3 trillion success
By Rachel VentrescaJune 24, 2026
2 hours ago
Amazon Prime Day isn’t a midsummer shopping event anymore. Here’s what changed in 2026
RetailAmazon
Amazon Prime Day isn’t a midsummer shopping event anymore. Here’s what changed in 2026
By Vidhi Choudhary and Retail BrewJune 23, 2026
12 hours ago
The hidden cost of your AI rollout: burning out the high performers running it
Workplace Cultureburnout
The hidden cost of your AI rollout: burning out the high performers running it
By Mikaela Cohen and HR BrewJune 23, 2026
12 hours ago
Quantum computing stocks surge after Trump signed executive orders backing the sector
Investingquantum computing
Quantum computing stocks surge after Trump signed executive orders backing the sector
By Marco Quiroz-GutierrezJune 23, 2026
13 hours ago
Alan Greenspan testifying before the Senate Banking Committee.
BankingFederal Reserve
The man who invented the Fed’s magic trick just died. His successor is about to try it again
By Eva RoytburgJune 23, 2026
14 hours ago
Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis (left) stands on a spiral staircase next to Google DeepMind researcher John Jumper.
NewslettersEye on AI
Defections from Google DeepMind prompt questions about Alphabet’s efforts to stay at the forefront of AI
By Jeremy KahnJune 23, 2026
14 hours ago

Most Popular

After forcing workers back to the office, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are now letting their staff work remotely—but only for the World Cup
Success
After forcing workers back to the office, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are now letting their staff work remotely—but only for the World Cup
By Orianna Rosa RoyleJune 23, 2026
21 hours ago
Markets tumble worldwide as Fed resets expectations: $400 billion wiped off SpaceX stock
Banking
Markets tumble worldwide as Fed resets expectations: $400 billion wiped off SpaceX stock
By Jim EdwardsJune 23, 2026
23 hours ago
Current price of oil as of June 23, 2026
Personal Finance
Current price of oil as of June 23, 2026
By Joseph HostetlerJune 23, 2026
20 hours ago
Meet the 2 men putting New York's $300 billion pension fund in play for the first time in 20 years
Investing
Meet the 2 men putting New York's $300 billion pension fund in play for the first time in 20 years
By Nick LichtenbergJune 22, 2026
2 days ago
Former U.S. Secret Service agent says bringing your authentic self to work stifles teamwork: 'You don’t get high performers, you get sloppiness'
Success
Former U.S. Secret Service agent says bringing your authentic self to work stifles teamwork: 'You don’t get high performers, you get sloppiness'
By Sydney LakeJune 21, 2026
3 days ago
Texas and Charlotte used to build huge McMansions—now they're copying the California design tricks they once mocked
Real Estate
Texas and Charlotte used to build huge McMansions—now they're copying the California design tricks they once mocked
By Sydney LakeJune 22, 2026
2 days ago

© 2026 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.