🏀 ⛹️
Today we will do without special surprises, because in the Unicode set there are emoji, which are almost impossible to interpret figuratively. Just such emoticons are Basketball Emoji, which we will talk about today. However, looking ahead, let us tell you that even these pictures mean much more to some people than just a sport.
🏀 The “Basketball” emoticon was assigned the code U+1F3C0, with which it was added to the Activities section of the Unicode 6.0 standard in 2010.
⛹️ The “Basketball player” emoticon was assigned the code U+26F9 U+FE0F, with which it was added to the People and Body section of Unicode Standard 5.2 in 2009.
So, the main symbol of one of the most popular sports in the world is a heavy and bouncy orange ball with black stripes. And to begin with, we want to tell you a little bit of its history.
In 1891, a high school physical education teacher named James Naismith was pondering an important question. He wondered how to get his students involved in sports when the soccer season was over. Naismith decided on a drastic measure – he invented his own sport: he hung an ordinary peach basket in the gymnasium, and the students started throwing a ball into it. In the beginning, it was a soccer ball. The special equipment for the new game came later.
In 1894, Naismith turned to the Spalding company and asked them to come up with a projectile specifically for basketball. They created a leather ball that was fastened with laces, weighed about six hundred grams and was larger than a modern soccer ball.
After another 5 years, the balls lost their laces and became more elastic, voluminous and solid. At the same time, a new design appeared – not with four, but with eight stripes.
The National Basketball Association approved the innovation in the seventies. It also liked the full-grain leather ball, which was invented at Spalding. At first leather was the main material for balls, but in the late nineties synthetic materials began to be used. These quickly gained acceptance in most leagues. The NBA, however, still uses real leather.
Why are basketballs always orange? The answer is simple: they used to be made of dirty orange leather, and the classic coloring is an homage to the technology of the old days.
Now let’s talk about the use of emoji related to basketball. Let’s start, perhaps, with the basketball player. (By the way, there are versions of this emoji with different skin colors in the Unicode set.) So, in addition to its direct meaning, this emoticon can be used in messages related to sports in general, or as an offer to spend an active evening, or as an invitation to training.
As for the basketball emoji, first of all, it is of course the main symbol of basketball in general. Use this emoticon in posts and messages related to basketball games and everything related to it, in the context of NBA news, or just school practices.
The sport is popular on every continent, making it one of the most evenly distributed sports on the planet. Nevertheless, of course, the main mecca of basketball remains the United States, where more than half of the population is into it. That is why for millions of people basketball is a symbol of sports in general. Moreover, the basketball emoji can accompany messages related to hobbies and hobbies, and even with an invitation to a date, because this emoticon can add playfulness.
So, as we warned at the very beginning of the article, there is nothing shocking associated with the basketball emoji. Moreover, this emoticon is quite difficult to present in any negative context, unless you are injured during the game. Play sports, have fun, and use the basketball emoji more often in your life.