The man who created emoji has revealed his favourite one

Shigetaka Kurita created emojis in 1999 whilsthe was working for NTT DoCoMo, a japanese company that created the world’s first mobile internet service.

In an interview with the Guardian, Kurita explained that he created emoji to solve not being able to write more than 250 characters in an email – for Japanese mobile service provider i-mode - at the time. Kurita thought using emoji wasquicker and took up less space.

Emoji have come a long way since; the first one Kurita created was black and white and didn’t have much distinction owing to the technological limitations at the time. However, the colourful little icons are now ubiquitous.

The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York has recently acquired thefirst set of the original 176 emoji for itsgrowing digital collection.

Kurita said that the heart is his favourite. "I still have a soft spot for the ones that communicate positive emotions."

When he created emoji he drew inspiration from daily life and made two hundred icons. The characters were inspired by general things; such as the weather and food.