Twitter Create New Emoji to Encourage People to Vote in the EU Referendum

BuzzFeed

If you're in the UK then you're bound to have heard at least a little something about the upcoming EU Referendum. The government are asking us to vote whether we want to stay in or leave Europe, but it appears as if many young people are not registered to vote. In an attempt to encourage them to register, Twitter and the Electoral Commission created two new emoji.

Until midnight on the 7th of June you could use the hashtag #EURefReady and a neon tick emoji would appear. This would tell users that you were registered to vote in the EU Referendum. If enough people were using that tick, the Electoral Commission were hoping that it would make more people realise that they should register too. You technically didn't have to register to vote to use the emoji and it wasn't so hugely special that a lot of users felt like they needed to register to vote so they could have a reason to use it. If enough people were to use the emoji, though, then people may have realised how many of their friends and acquaintances were actually interested and planned on voting. Essentially they were hoping that the emoji would work as a kind of peer pressure.

From today (8th of June), another emoji will appear with a different hashtag. Now, whenever you type out #EURef you'll see a little ballot emoji. By this point, it's too late to actually register to vote, but they hope it'll keep the discussion going. The EU Referendum is going to be one of the most important votes in the UK for a long time and it is important that people keep discussing what is actually going on, as otherwise things might not be clear for the interested parties.

The use of emoji is an essential part of how people in this day and age communicate. They're a visual cue and a way to start a conversation without having to say something in detail. If one little tick tells everyone you know that you're going to vote, then they can see that this referendum is important to you and that may make them re-think. Two emoji and two hashtags might not sound like much, but in the end, that could be all we need to get things going.

Rosina Brooker

Rosina is a Songbird writer with a degree in Creative Writing. She's trying to focus on her novel on the side but is glad to be playing around with apps and writing about them in the mean time! Follow her @Songbird_Rosina

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