Tape Cartridge refers to a proposed or discussed storage-media symbol concept associated with Unicode-era efforts to preserve computer and office icons, rather than an emoji that became part of the officially recommended emoji set. It is best understood as a legacy technology symbol: a rectangular magnetic tape data cartridge used for backups, archives, and older computing systems. While related storage emojis such as floppy disk, optical disc, DVD, and videocassette exist, Tape Cartridge never became a commonly supported Apple/iOS emoji or an RGI emoji used across major platforms.
The intended meanings would likely have included data backup, archiving, retro computing, obsolete technology, saving files, long-term storage, and βold mediaβ nostalgia. People may have wanted such an emoji because magnetic tape cartridges were important in enterprise computing, libraries, server rooms, and early digital workflows, making the symbol useful for technical conversations that the floppy disk emoji does not fully cover. In internet culture it could fit retro tech memes, Y2K aesthetics, vaporwave-style nostalgia, βancient backupβ jokes, and posts about recovering old data or preserving digital history.
Apple does not appear to have produced a standard colorful emoji design for Tape Cartridge, so any Apple/iOS-style depiction would be conceptual rather than official. A likely mockup would show a small gray or black rectangular cartridge with rounded corners, a white label area, perhaps visible reel circles or a tape window, and the glossy shaded style typical of early iOS emoji artwork. In proposal or symbol-reference imagery, it would more likely have appeared as a simple monochrome icon resembling a data tape cassette, visually close to but more technical-looking than the πΌ videocassette emoji.
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Emoji History The emoji code/ image log of changes.
This emoji was one of the "suggested emojis" the Unicode group unveiled in June 2014 [article], however, it has been, and still is, up to the companies who support emoji in their operating systems to provide not only images but also an algorithm to replace the emoji code into the emoji image.
