![2boys after_anal after_sex anus ass bare_shoulders black_gloves black_shorts blue_background blue_sports_bra blush cody_(dross) cum cum_in_ass cumdrip dross ejaculation emoji english_text eyebrows_visible_through_hair fingerless_gloves from_behind gloves hair_between_eyes hands_on_own_ass highres long_hair looking_back multiple_boys nose_blush open_mouth original otoko_no_ko penis perineum platinum_blonde_hair ponytail shorts shorts_pull shorts_tan speech_bubble sports_bra spread_anus spread_ass sweat tan tanline testicles uncensored yaoi rating:e score:58 post #3656298](/cdn_image/preview/35/33/3533aa02670353507d78358bab310b2a.jpg)
Emoji are Unicode characters designed to represent pictograms and emoticons. The term itself, however, is most often used to refer to the pictograms and emoticons themselves. The word "Emoji" comes from the Japanese word "絵" (e, "picture") + "文字" (moji, "character"). Its resemblance to the word "emoticon" is purely coincidental.
Emoji as we know them originated as a proprietary system by a Japanese mobile phone operator NTT DoCoMo using a Unicode private-use block to encode their emoticons. While other mobile providers used many other systems for emoji, this system was the most compact implementation used at the time (and the closest to the current one).
Emoji became a standardized system with its implementation in Unicode 6.0 in 2010 but it's only around 2014-2015 that their use exploded and became commonplace to the point that they became a cultural phenomenon with real world merchandise and even a movie about them.