Emoji communication and kanji

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Did you know that the word "emoji" comes from Japanese "e" which means "picture" and "moji" (pronounced with a long O, "mouji" means "character"? (Kanji means "Chinese character" as you would say "Roman alphabet" even though you are using it for English). People in the Western world often rephrase it to be "emo" as in "emotion", so it is a picture that represents your emotion about something. I find it interesting that so many people who use languages with an alphabet or syllabary, which means you can look at a word and pronounce it (at least in some languages, English sometimes excepted), suddenly like the idea of communicating with emoji, which if you think about it is how Chinese writing started. Kanji started as pictures of things and then gradually took on a shape that was easier to write, but the background picture is still there. People who study Japanese or Chinese often complain that there are so many characters to learn, but your average Internet user often communicates using one of many emoji. I for one need to look at the "definition" in myLot "code" to make sure I am using what I really want to say. Some people have gotten in big trouble on social media by posting a "LOL"' emoji when they wanted to represent sorrow or crying. It seems like emoji are here to stay in our languages. Do you use emoji in emails, letters and on social media? How do you use them? Would your communication be less effective if you didn't have them?