Apple issued a store-wide prohibition on all AppStore support for Emoji Friday, according to a report at ArsTechnica.
Emoji, the cute graphical images favored by many heavy SMS text users and a standard part of mobile communications in Japan, are “hidden” on iPhones sold outside Japan. However in recent months, third party apps and other hacks have appeared, allowing all iPhone users to access Emoji through the phone’s International keyboard options.
iPhone developer Gary Fung, whose Typing Genius has been a hit among Emoli lovers, told ArsTechnica Friday that existing applications that offer Emoji enabling beyond their base functionality have been ordered to remove Emoji support.
Fung said that Apple has required an immediate update to his Typing Genius program with the Emoji support removed and the same order appears to have gone out to all developers whose App Store marketing text mentions support for the Emoji feature.
For a more detailed description of how Emoji are enabled on the iPhone and some speculation about why — beyond the company being just plain mean — Apple came down on all the Emoji-san, see blogger/developer Erica Sadun’s report at ArsTechnica.
Lonnie Lazar is a writer-musician-web designer-attorney. He writes about Apple for Cult of Mac and Mac|Life, and about VoIP and telecommunications for Voxilla. Follow Lonnie on Twitter @LonnieLazar, join the Cult of Mac on Facebook, and find Lonnie’s photos on Flickr.
