Go ahead and pull up the paper emoji on your iPhone. The little white page, the one that looks completely blank from a distance. Now zoom in. There’s a letter in there. It’s addressed to someone named Katie. It’s signed by someone named John Appleseed. And it has been sitting inside that emoji, invisible to most people, since iOS 5. Instagram user Ella (@el_michelle1) posted a video zooming in on the emoji in December 2025, and it spread rapidly, racking up millions of views from people who could not quite believe they’d been sending that little icon around for years without knowing what was written on it. As LADbible reported in its coverage of the discovery, the reaction split neatly between people who immediately recognized the text and people who absolutely did not. theres an actual message on apple’s paper emoji. pic.twitter.com/67ka0MAsaD— sui (@birdabo) January 26, 2026 Those who recognized it knew it right away. The letter contains the full text of Apple’s “Think Different” campaign, which ran from 1997 to 2002 and became one of the most celebrated advertising moments in the company’s history. It reads, in part: “Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently.” The letter ends: “Take care, John Appleseed.” Per Emojipedia, which documents the design details of every emoji across platforms, the text has been embedded in Apple’s paper emoji since the icon was introduced. It’s not just the paper emoji, either. As Creative Bloq noted, the same hidden text shows up in Apple’s notebook, memo, scroll, and clipboard emojis, and the receipt emoji contains a partial reference with the words “misfits,” “square pegs,” and “round holes” listed as line items. The name “John Appleseed” is Apple’s longstanding demo persona, used across its software and marketing materials for decades. As for Katie, nobody outside Apple knows for certain. The name varies slightly across emoji versions, appearing as “Kate,” “Katie,” or “Dear Katie” depending on which icon you’re looking at. It’s worth noting that Apple isn’t the only platform hiding things in its emoji designs. As Emojipedia documents, Samsung’s version of the clipboard emoji was once addressed “Dear Samsung,” and Facebook’s clipboard features what appears to be a small table of first names and dates, possibly birthdays. The response to Ella’s video captured something genuine: the strange pleasure of discovering that something you’ve looked at hundreds of times contained a message you never noticed. “Attention to detail is insane,” one commenter wrote. Another said: “I love when developers leave such tokens of their own in the things they built.” A third simply wanted to know: “Who is Katie?” Apple, characteristically, has not said. You can follow Ella (@el_michelle1) on Instagram for lifestyle content. This article originally appeared earlier this year. The post The little paper emoji on your phone has words on it and people are stunned at what it says appeared first on Upworthy.