‘Laughing face with tears of joy’ emoji named Word of the Year

The Oxford Dictionary has chosen an emoji as its ‘Word of the Year’.

Yep.

The ‘Face with tears of joy’ icon was apparently chosen on the strength of numbers – it accounts for 20 per cent of all emoji use in the UK (who measures that?!).

Ross and John asked Mark Gwynn, the Australian National Dictionary Centre’s editor, how – and why – this happened.

Click play to hear the chat.

Mr Gwynne said ‘Face blowing love-heart kisses’ was also a hot contender, accounting for about 9 per cent of all emoji use in the US.

Ross: That, to me, looks like a drunk person.

He prefers the ‘Red wine’ and ‘Horse’ icons.

Burnso’s more of a thumbs up kind of guy.