Apple Responds To ‘BagelGate’ With A New Emoji Featuring Cream Cheese

Apple has been accused of some pretty heinous things, but the latest controversy facing the company is amusingly controversial. The tech company was just about to add a new bagel to its emoji line-up, but the sad little breakfast staple was met with outcry from bagel lovers who said that the bagel looked “factory-produced,” dry, and unappetizing. Twitter users were quick to jump on the bandwagon, calling on Apple to change the image, according to Business Insider.

Apple was all set to release the new bagel icon when people began to call out the new look. New emojis are approved by the Unicode Consortium, a non-profit independent standards group, but the companies who create the images have some license to decide how they want any particular emoji to look. It seems as though — in this case — Apple fell short of the expectations set by serious bagel fanatics.

Twitter users were not impressed with the new bagel, calling it everything from a “monstrosity” to labeling it #sadbagel. CNBC contributor Josh Brown threatened to organize a march against the offending image.

“I’m organizing a march in New York City against Apple’s just-revealed bagel emoji, which comes out with the next iOS update. It looks like something you get from a cardboard box in the freezer section at Walmart. This insult will not stand,” he tweeted.

Morning show host Pat Kiernan tweeted that New Yorkers demanded more of their breakfast emojis.

“You call this factory-produced bagel an emoji that stands for all bagels??? New Yorkers demand more,” he said.

Grub Street got in on the Twitter debate, calling the new bagel a “monstrosity.”

Apple heard the call and heroically stepped in with a new image. This one features a larger, more appetizing bagel — complete with a spread of cream cheese. Emojipedia founder Jeremy Burge spotted the updated bagel emoji, saying that the new version would hit phones with Apple’s iOS 12.1 update.

This isn’t the first time that a tech giant has dealt with some public controversy over its emojis. Earlier this year, Google was lambasted for putting an egg in its salad emoji, which made the emoji unfriendly to vegan users. Google changed the image to remove the egg, leaving lettuce and tomato. Some Twitter users joked that Google should remove the lettuce and tomato to be completely inclusive.

“There’s big talk about inclusion and diversity at Google so if you need any evidence of Google is making this priority may I direct your attention to the [salad] emoji— we’ve removed the egg in Android P beta 2, making this a more inclusive vegan salad,” Google UX Manager Jennifer Daniel wrote of the change.

There's big talk about inclusion and diversity at Google so if you need any evidence of Google is making this priority may I direct your attention to the ? emoji— we've removed the egg in Android P beta 2, making this a more inclusive vegan salad. pic.twitter.com/kzHY0A9ZjG

— jenniferdaniel@typo.social ? (@jenniferdaniel) June 6, 2018