The Unicode Consortium is a non-profit organization that develops and maintains the Unicode Standard, which is a system for encoding, representing, and managing text in most of the world's writing systems. This standard ensures that text appears consistently across different devices and platforms, making it easier to share and communicate in various languages. Founded in 1991, the Unicode Consortium works with various stakeholders, including software developers, corporations, and governments, to promote the use of the Unicode Standard. It also oversees the addition of new characters and symbols, ensuring that diverse languages and cultures are represented in digital communication.