The most popular word of 2014 has been revealed, and is not actually a word at all but a symbol meaning love.

2014年最流行的詞語出爐。嚴格意義上來說，它并非是一個詞語，而是一個愛的符號。

A heart 'emoji' was the most widely used character in blogs, Twitter and Facebook and in 250,000 global news outlets in the last 12 months, according to analysts.

有分析數據顯示，過去的12個月中，博客、推特、臉書以及全球25萬家新聞媒體使用頻率最高的字符是心形“表情符號”。

The increasing prominence of the emoji or emoticon shows how symbols are making their way into the English language with the rise of the internet.

表情符號在英語中大行其道，顯示出網絡快速發展時期，符號正在強勢崛起。

There are now 722 recognised characters which portray an emotion, expression, or state of mind, or a person, place or thing - with another 250 to be made available over the next year.?The list was compiled by the Global Language Monitor in Austin, Texas, which analyses the use of words and symbols in blogs, social media and 250,000 of the most popular online and print news outlets across the world.

目前共有722個表現感情、表情、心情，或人、場所、物品的符號。2015年將會新增250個表情符號。位于美國德克薩斯州奧斯丁市的全球語言檢測機構（Global Language Monitor）通過分析博客、社交媒體以及全球25萬家主流在線和出版媒體中詞語和符號的使用情況，發布了2014年度流行詞語榜。

Researchers found the heart emoji appeared billions of times a day across the world.

研究者們發現全世界每天會出現幾十億個心形符號。

Other words that rose to popularity in 2014 were 'vape' from the term vaporise, used to refer to electronic or e-cigarettes. This word appeared in the Oxford Dictionary's top word for 2014. Prince George also made the list along with the phenomena blood moon - referring to the blood red colour of the moon after it passes in the earth's shadow, causing the sun's red light to scatter.

2014年其他的流行詞語還有“vape”，演變自“vaporise（蒸發）”，指代電子煙。該詞在牛津詞典2014年詞語榜上排名第一。喬治王子和血月亮也都榜上有名。血月亮現象是指月亮在脫離地球的陰影后受太陽紅光照射呈現出血紅色的情況。

Paul Payack, president of Global Language Monitor, said: 'The English Language is now undergoing a remarkable transformation unlike any in its 1400 year history - its system of writing, the alphabet, is gaining characters at amazing rate.

全球語言檢測機構主席保羅?帕亞克(Paul Payack)表示:”英語正在經歷一場1400年來都不曾有過的巨大變革―書寫系統，也就是字母系統正在以驚人的速度吸收各種符號。”

'These character are ideographs or pictographs that are called emoji and emoticons.

“這些符號被叫做表情文字和表情符號，是一種象形或圖形文字?！?/p>

'There are about a thousand emoji characters now officially recognised by Unicode Consortium, the official keepers of coding that forms the basis of the internet.

“現在大約有1000個經編碼聯盟（Unicode Consortium）認證的表情符號。編碼聯盟負責管理構成網絡基礎的各種程序編碼?！?/p>

'They regularly review new suggestions with the next 37 or so being finalised for June 2015.

“他們定期審查每次新增的37條編碼建議，這些建議將在2015年6月得到確認。”

'Then the new emoji can be embedded in any number of devices for any number of languages.'

“那時新的表情符號就可以適用于所有的語言環境和設備?！?/p>

The list is the 15th annual survey compiled by Global Language Media. Last year '404' appeared as the most popular word - the internet error message showing the popularity of online media.

年度流行詞語榜是全球語言媒體（Global Language Media）開展的第15項年度調查研究。去年排名榜首的流行詞語是“404”——網絡錯誤頁面提示詞，展現了網絡媒體的快速普及。

Social media and the internet strongly influenced words appearing in the list - with hashtag, photobomb and clickbait all in the list.

社交媒體和網絡極大地影響了流行詞語的排名——主題標簽（hashtag）、照片炸彈（photobomb）、點擊誘餌（clickbait）等都榜上有名。

Ebola earned top place in the list of names - above Pope Francis and Prince George. The project also included the most common phrases for 2014 with 'Hands up, don't shoot' in the number one spot. This phrase was coined by protesters who called for action after the shooting of black teenager Michael Brown in St Louis, Missouri in August.

在名字年度流行榜上埃博拉高居榜首——緊隨其后的是教皇方濟格和喬治王子。這個年度調查研究項目還盤點了2014年最常見的短語，“舉起手來，別開槍（Hands up, don't shoot）”占據頭名。該短語由8月美國黑人少年邁克爾?布朗（Michael Brown）被槍擊后為其游行示威的抗議者們所使用。

（翻譯：orchismessi 編輯：陳丹妮）