←back to thread

Apple Hides Taiwan Flag in Hong Kong

(blog.emojipedia.org)
1456 points pulisse | 3 comments | 07 Oct 19 16:24 UTC | HN request time: 0.492s | source
Show context
seph-reed ◴[07 Oct 19 16:42 UTC] No.21182912[source]▶
Maybe I'm being naive, but it seems like a better response would be to add a bunch of other "not real country" flags. Flags from ancient civilizations, or countries that no longer exist. Then they wouldn't be taking a stand as the people responsible for defining what is and is not a country.
replies(4): >>21182984 #>>21182994 #>>21183120 #>>21183356 #
1. dmitrygr ◴[07 Oct 19 17:16 UTC] No.21183356[source]▶
That would not actually work due to how unicode works. There really is not a code point for Taiwanese flag, or Russian flag, or American flag. In fact, each flag is made of two code points, making up the ISO code for the country. So, for Taiwan, the flag is made of code point "flag T" and "flag W". And yes, this means that to correctly render unicode, you need to know the current geopolitical situation in the world (fun, right?)

This also means that you cannot easily add non-existent countries. They do not have country codes

replies(2): >>21183551 #>>21185837 #
2. ◴[07 Oct 19 17:29 UTC] No.21183551[source]▶
3. seph-reed ◴[07 Oct 19 20:53 UTC] No.21185837[source]▶
This is an extremely quality response. Thank you for the info.