Language Icon
The language icon is a specific icon designed for people to select a specific language to use when they face multi-lingual, multi-national websites.[1]
Description
The icon, referred to as "Turnstile Icon", is an abstract representation of a
History
The initial Language icon was designed by Onur Mustak Cobanli and his team in 2008 when they planned to build a
License
Its website says it is under an unnamed "CC license"; however, this is actually a
Instead, the license for the license icon has the following conditions:
- Relax-Attribution. You are suggested but not required to attribute the work when using for internet / digital use. You must attribute it in any other use which is not on internet. Attribute to: A’ Design Award & Competition, Onur Müştak Çobanlı and Farhat Datta with URL http://www.languageicon.org for non-internet usage.
- Share Alike. If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under the same or similar license to this one, attribute to original author, resulting work cannot be commercial.
- Semi-Noncommercial. You may not use this work as a central element (or one of the core elements) for commercial purposes; Such as a design on a t-shirt, on a book cover etc. unless you attribute to the author. On the other hand, you can use freely in your websites without attribution to signify language.
- Color-Friendly: You can change the colors as you like, keep the form intact please; scale proportionally. You can reverse the color or grayscale it if required.
Adoption
Datta expressed the wish that "It would be great if it was accepted as the Language Icon universally and used a[s] such".[6] While initially receiving widespread adoption, it would be replaced in several key contexts due to concern over the unorthodox licensing of the design.
- The language icon was adopted into the widely used "Font Awesome" icon package in Font Awesome version 4[7] in 2014.
- Font Awesome version 5 abandoned the language icon, replacing it with a plain A and 文 symbol for language selection[8] in 2018.
- Google Translate has had a G and 文 symbol since January 2015.
- Creative Commons itself used the symbol for some years before replacing it in a site style update.[9]
See also
References
- ^ a b "Language Icon". www.languageicon.org. Archived from the original on 2024-02-04.
- ^ "Language Icons - A world wide initiative to create an universal language icon". www.languageicon.org. Retrieved 2021-05-03.
- ^ "A' Design Award and Competition – Language Icon". competition.adesignaward.com.
- ^ "Language Icon:language Turnstile by Farhat Datta". www.designforu.org. Design For You. Archived from the original on 2016-05-05.
- ^ "Modifying the CC licenses - Creative Commons".
- ^ Language Turnstile Language Icon by Farhat Datta Design Interview Language Turnstile
- ^ "fa-language". Font Awesome 4.7. Retrieved 2022-01-05.
- ^ "fa-language". Font Awesome 5.15. Retrieved 2022-01-05.
- ^ https://github.com/creativecommons/cc-legal-tools-app/issues/270