Re: best gnome globe icon ever

[Alex Combas <ghetto_samurai shaw ca>]

On Wed, 2003-06-25 at 00:33, Tuomas Kuosmanen wrote:

> I think the point is not trying to please all inhabitants of every
> continent, but to make an image that is recognizable as "the world".
> Sure, you could localize icons so that .fi locale shows Finland towards
> you, but uh, I dont really think it is a real problem for the usability
> of an application.
> 

I have to agree. 

To me it seems that the point of an icon is to map a familiar shape to a
known process or concep. A really good icon is one that is imediately
recognizable and is therefore intuitive to its purpose. While a
geographically correct map would make a good image, it would
unfortunately make a poor icon imho because as was mentioned in an
earlier post "most people have no idea what a map of the earth actually
looks like". An icons job is not to educate, its job is to look prety ;)
and also to increase user productivity by being easily recognized and
therefore making the application easier to find and use.

~Alex