Considering I have actual relatives who would never in a million years make the connection between on/off and 1/0, (and they are not stupid, old, uneducated or otherwise outlying cases) I think it's foolish to believe that this symbol is as universally comprehensible as you would like to believe it is. It is certainly not "universally recognized" or known.
Katie >Why would it lose its meaning in an underdeveloped country?? > >I think you would have to travel pretty far to find a country where people >didn't know the meaning of 0 and 1. >And if you where even able to find a country that didn't know 0 from 1, >didn't have engineers and didn't have electricity they wouldn't need a power >button anyway :-) >Btw, check out the symbol used on the power button on the One Laptop Per >Child. > >I've thought a little bit about why I react to this discussion. I agree that >the symbol is very engineer-ish, not especially intuitive and not >particularly good looking. But as an IxD I jump at ANY chance to build on >prior knowledge, things people know. This symbol has been around for 40 >years, is standardized, is culture-proof - interpreted in exactly the same >way over the entire globe. Are there more than a handful of other symbols in >the same league? The play/pause symbol qualifies I guess. Why would anyone >want to mess with a symbol that is universally recognized? Why not try to >fix the gazillion of things that are broken instead of breaking the few >things that work? I don't get it. > >This is turning into a rant. Sorry! :-) > >Morten -- ---------------- Katie Albers [EMAIL PROTECTED] ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
