Microsoft brings back Clippy

(CNN) – Clippy has not had an easy life. Microsoft’s iconic but polarizing virtual assistant first appeared in Windows 97 as a small clip to help Microsoft Office users. Office 2007 gave it the first push.

Earlier this year, Clippy resurfaced for a day as an animated sticker in Microsoft Teams before the company removed it.

Now ahead of World Emoji Day on Saturday, Microsoft announced plans to replace its standard clip-on emoji with a picture of Clippy, a happy, big-eyed helper. This step is part of a larger update of 1,800 emojis across all Microsoft applications and services, which will roll out later this year.

“When we thought about redesigning the clip, we thought, ‘How not to do it?” Claire Anderson, Microsoft’s art director known internally as the emoji-ologist, told CNN Business. “It’s a way of honoring where we come from as we also look at a new tech style … but like most things nostalgic, we know that Clippy can be polarizing.”

Microsoft teased Clippy’s return in a tweet this Wednesday. The company promised, or “threatened,” as some tech publications say, that if it received 20,000 Likes, it would replace the paper clip emoji in Microsoft 365 with Clippy.

Microsoft has been working on an emoji update for the past year, choosing 3D designs over 2D and opting to animate most of them. This change is in line with its new design language, Fluent, which the company calls brighter, more vibrant and more human. “We want design to lift up and make people happy,” Anderson said.

He’s also adding five new emojis to capture the many moods and challenges that working from home brings: a “you’re quiet” emoji, a picture of someone multitasking with their arms going everywhere, an emoji of a person. dressed appropriately from the waist up, someone with a cat in front of the screen and a person with a baby.

“We reflected on the past year and thought about what it looks like in emojiland, and those are the ones that caught our attention the most because it’s part of how we live now and the interactions that happen all the time,” Anderson said.

Microsoft also conducted a study in which it found that 57% of people believe that emojis at work are professional and help humanize conversations. Emojis are often used as tools to lighten or intensify tones, express joy, or enhance expression.

“Body language, surrounding environment, subtle forms of humor – the loss of these greatly impacts our communication, but with a few pixels, we can telegraph our thoughts and feelings in fun, clear, and emotionally resonant ways,” Anderson explained. in a blog post.

A new Adobe study released Thursday revealed that “laughing out loud” is the world’s most popular emoji, followed by “thumbs up” and “red heart” emojis.

Microsoft’s new emoji will launch in the coming months, starting with the Flipgrid video tool in August and other platforms, such as Teams and Windows, during the holiday season.