Symbols of every form and nature have formed the basis forcommunication-from Sumerian cuneiform and Mayan pictographs toEgyptian hieroglyphics, and back again to the icons we use in digital applications. The web browser Google Chrome, one of the most commonly used on the market today, has an instantly recognizable logo; various interface icons guide users:. In this post, I examine two central Chrome icons—the Chrome logo and the refresh button—through ancient writing systems, focusing on how each conveysmeaning, what ideas a user must learn, and what metaphors they rely on.
The Google Chrome logo is a circular shape divided into four colored sections: red, green, yellow, and blue, which represents Google’s brand identity. It means web access and internet browsing. Comparatively, Egyptian hieroglyphs also used different colors and geometric forms to carry meaning. The shen ring , for example, is a circular symbol that indicated eternity and protection, much as the Chrome logo symbolizes infinite connectivity and access.
What’s being communicated?
The Chrome logo is a portal to the internet, while the shen ring is a symbol of eternal protection.
What are the concepts to be learned?
The user needs to learn that the Chrome logo is a browser icon and not just a colorful shape, similar to how ancient Egyptians learned the meanings of various glyphs.
What metaphors are used?
This is indicative of completeness and continuity, much like the unbroken cycle was symbolic with the shen ring. This is further deconstructed with the use of primary colors reinforcing Google’s brand identity, as the color coding used in hieroglyphs accented meaning.
Chrome’s refresh button bears a circular arrow that indicates it refreshes or updates a web page. That was Sumerian cuneiform markings: the accounting of trading, inventory, and news in givingtestimony to change by indenting clay with curvilinear and linear impressions. Just as the set of cuneiform symbols condensed into one readable mark an extremely complex activity, the refresh icon acts in the same way.
What’s the message?
Refresh icon expresses the idea of renewal. On the other hand, Cuneiform means transactional update. They both change with continuity.
What concepts must be learned?
The user has to learn that the arrow represents refresh of a page, just like the Sumerians had to learn that the wedge shaped marks represented records in evolution.
What metaphors are being used?
The circular arrow is metaphorically representing repetition and flow just like the cuneiform marks represented a continuum of communication and record keeping.
Google Chrome relies on iconography that conveys meaning through learned associations, metaphor, and abstraction-similar to ancient writing systems. Digital symbols, from the browser logo in stylized form to refresh icons, act much like the pictographs and cuneiform of the ancients: facilitating communication across cultures and time.