Okay, so Samsung released an updated keyboard with lots and lots of new features. I stuck with SwiftKey. Now, the new SwiftKey update brings a whole new bunch of similar features and that's great! EXCEPT:
Let's talk emojis. In previous versions of SwiftKey, selection of emojis opened in the "Recents" section where a user's most commonly-used emojis reside. Now, though, there's a new option that is the default option: it's called "Crystal Ball" and it brings up a menu of possible emojis a user MIGHT want to use, based on the words preceding the emoji. The main problem is that they are in a completely random order, and users have to stop and look around to find an emoji that, in the "Recents" menu, would be in the #1 position. There is no way to change this default setting back to "Recents"... and SwiftKey is catching hell for it in their forums, from people like me.
There are few things on my phone that will get uninstalled faster than an app that thinks it's smarter than I am. I don't use many emojis... usually the same ones over and over. So what good would a whole page of possible emojis be to me? Especially when they are selected based on someone else's algorithm of what I MIGHT want to use? It slows me down considerably!
So yeah, there are some really disgruntled users in the SwiftKey forums. I'm hoping that if enough people complain about it, threaten to uninstall SwiftKey if it's not changed and then actually UNINSTALL the app, SwiftKey will panic and push out an update allowing users to select their own default emoji menu. But until they start seeing mass uninstalls over this same issue, I fear it's not going to change.
Let's talk emojis. In previous versions of SwiftKey, selection of emojis opened in the "Recents" section where a user's most commonly-used emojis reside. Now, though, there's a new option that is the default option: it's called "Crystal Ball" and it brings up a menu of possible emojis a user MIGHT want to use, based on the words preceding the emoji. The main problem is that they are in a completely random order, and users have to stop and look around to find an emoji that, in the "Recents" menu, would be in the #1 position. There is no way to change this default setting back to "Recents"... and SwiftKey is catching hell for it in their forums, from people like me.
There are few things on my phone that will get uninstalled faster than an app that thinks it's smarter than I am. I don't use many emojis... usually the same ones over and over. So what good would a whole page of possible emojis be to me? Especially when they are selected based on someone else's algorithm of what I MIGHT want to use? It slows me down considerably!
So yeah, there are some really disgruntled users in the SwiftKey forums. I'm hoping that if enough people complain about it, threaten to uninstall SwiftKey if it's not changed and then actually UNINSTALL the app, SwiftKey will panic and push out an update allowing users to select their own default emoji menu. But until they start seeing mass uninstalls over this same issue, I fear it's not going to change.
