[Fwd: Re: [Clipart] [Fwd: Re: OCAL logos]]

[Jonadab the Unsightly One]

Jon Phillips <jon at rejon.org> writes:

>>  logos are not icons ..
>> 
>> logos are symbolic 
>> icons are descriptive

Icons are symbolic by definition (both in the original sense and in
the computer jargon sense of the word "icon").

However, logos and icons are not precisely the same thing, though an
icon is often derived from a logo.

A logo is the definitive visual symbol for a particular product,
company, organization, or cetera.  An icon is any image that is used
to symbolize something -- it does not have to be a universal symbol
for that thing; it only has to be used to represent it.  For example,
a stylized fish (icthus) is a common icon for the Christian church,
but it is not in any meaningful sense the logo for Christianity.  (If
the Christian church had a logo (it doesn't per se, but if it did) it
would probably be the cross.  Some denominations have logos, and most
feature the cross in some way.)  Similarly, Uncle Sam and Lady Liberty
are common icons for the United States, and sometimes a silhouette of
the shape of the (continental) US is used as an icon, but none of
these is the logo of the United States -- the flag is probably the
closest thing we have to a logo for the country.

An icon is symbolic, but a logo is *definitively* symbolic.  (Yes,
logos do change over time, but at any given time you only have one
current logo for any given thing.)

Also, icons are symbolic, but they are not necessarily symbolic of
things you can have logos for.  For example, an arrow pointing to the
left is an extremely common icon (symbolic image) for a "back" action
(e.g. in a web browser), so common as to basically be definitive, but
it can't really be called a "logo" because going back is an abstract
concept, not an entity (person, company, organization, product, ...).
Logos don't stand for abstract concepts; they are deliberately adopted
by the people/organizations/companies/whatever that they stand for,
and abstract concepts don't deliberately adopt things.  (Products
don't adopt things either per se, but the company behind the product
does so, and they can do so definitively because they have complete
control over the product -- unlike abstract concepts, which are
controlled by no one, and so no one has the unilateral wherewithal to
adopt a logo on their behalf.)

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