Tech: Find out what's special about this new selfie-based emoji app

The process of generating a selfbased emoji on the Bobble appIn February 2015 when Mohammed Wassem introduced stickers of wellknown Bollywood faces like Shah Rukh Khan as one of the features of Bobble a customisable emoji mobile app the download rate was a mere one per cent I put my team to work to find out where we were going wrong because I always believed Bollywood sells laughs the founder who holds a Masters degree in Human Resource from Delhi School of Economics and is now settled in San FranciscoA couple of days later at the suggestion of his team all below 25 years Wassem did away with Bollywood and introduced selfies instead And that almost broke the app Today it caters to over five million users where an average user spends 25 hours on the app every week In the first four months we got 1 million downloads We had to limit our users because we didnt have the bandwidth back then he says Popular among teenagers Bobble enjoys a cultlike following on school and college campuses across India The app was launched globally in September this yearStickers on BobbleBobble available on iOS and Android is a keyboard app that converts a users selfie to thousands of stickers mdash a first of its kind in the world of technology Although our target was the age group between 18 to 25 now 90 per cent of our users are younger than that he says Interestingly Bobble has the youngest user base mdash younger than even SnapchatDr Sharita Shah a Mumbaibased woman and child psychiatrist feels emojis have become a simpler way of expressing emotions Its particularly true for children who are shy and self conscious about expressing themselves verbally she saysTapping on trendsThe team recently created Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton stickers Like millions across the globe we realised Indians too have been following the US Presidential election with great fascination This election had been particularly nailbiting he saysMohammed WassemWhile conducting research among college students Wassem says he found out that although people were talking more they were expressing less There was a shift towards a more visual mode of conversation So we decided to make mobile conversations more expressive and personal he says Although the app is all about fun creating it wasnt easy The technologies we work on are very advanced and as a startup it was difficult to find resources to support the development he saysIts USP is the realtime personalisation of content with users own face and relevant text We created a technology that adjusts the expression on every face to match the emotion of the sticker We give colours to your cheeks and move your lips Even the background can changeThe topics that dominate virtual conversations are what else but love and romance Its quite subtle Not the I love you to bits kind It ranges from Hey youre looking beautiful to Lets catch up for a coffee he says The team has tied up with movie production houses for dialogues that can be used in the message The dialogue from a recent film where Ranveers character tells Deepikas Bajirao ne Mastani se mohabbat kari hai aiyyashi nahi was the most downloaded he revealsAnkit Gupta a college student from south Delhi sends at least two stickers a day to his friends A friend had shared a sticker with me and it had his face with a funny text imprinted on it I think its the humour element that got me hooked says Gupta whose emojis revolve around Friday night plans and boring lectures