But that kinda is Apple's modus operandi. The left app store gatekeeper doesn't know what the right one approved or disapproved of last week, so you get smacked down seemingly randomly.
This is unambiguously copyright infringement, it is not at all “random” for Apple to enforce it in this case but to also allow animated emojis in other apps that do not steal their IP to include those features.
In the US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property_protecti...
> Typefaces cannot be protected by copyright in the United States (Code of Federal Regulations, Ch 37, Sec. 202.1(e); Eltra Corp. vs. Ringer). The idea that typefaces cannot be copyrighted in the United States is black letter law since the introduction of 37 C.F.R. § 202.1(e) in 1992. Under U.S. law, typefaces and their letter forms or glyphs are considered utilitarian objects whose public utility outweighs any private interest in protecting their creative elements.
Do we have proof that it's due to the style similarities? So far all I've seen has been "Telegram complains X" and "Apple has not commented". I'm not familiar enough with Apple's emoji, nor does one short preview show enough detail on Telegram's, to accurately judge that... but it would certainly be contentious if they were seemingly "the same". If / when Apple animates their own, they'll certainly want to standardize across all apps, and that's something they're pretty consistent about.