[Pidgin] #451: No Proticol icons

[Pidgin]

#451: No Proticol icons
------------------------------+---------------------------------------------
  Reporter:  AishaDracogryph  |       Owner:        
      Type:  defect           |      Status:  closed
  Priority:  minor            |   Milestone:        
 Component:  pidgin (gtk)     |     Version:  2.0   
Resolution:  wontfix          |    Keywords:  Icons 
   Pending:  0                |  
------------------------------+---------------------------------------------
Comment (by merwin):

 Replying to [comment:17 dogfood]:
 > Seeking volunteers to fork Ostrich to introduce Protocol Icons.
 Already been done. The patch can be found here:
 http://merwin.bespin.org/pidgin/
 > The Ostrich developers both seem to have their head in the sand when it
 comes to legitimate user requests as well as to be placing greater value
 on theoretical notions of UI design and abstraction than on the way people
 actually exist as social creatures.
 Funny, heads in the sand
 > To wit, protocol icons are highly useful as evidenced by the number of
 requests for them. This, in and of itself, should be enough to for the
 developers to put them back. However there are also deep and impossible to
 refute socio-theoretic reasons to include them as well.
 To be fair, nobody knows the number of users who want this feature...
 could be a few, could be a lot.
 > They, of course, are willfully ignoring that different protocols have
 different strengths when it comes to communications beyond simple text. In
 fact it's useful to know what one will be able to easily communicate
 before initiating communication. More concretely, if I want to send a
 particular photo or video or joke or file, it's nice to know at a glance
 who I can easily send it to.
 Hey, that reason has already been proved invalid :)
 > More importantly, Ostrich developers ignore that, as social creatures,
 protocol icons give us a vital context clue as to who we have represented
 ourselves as in the past to be, and who we wish to continue to represent
 ourselves as, and how we know people. We have different identities in
 different contexts and we need visual clues as to which identity belongs
 where. These clues also help us remember who others are. Some complaints
 about missing protocol icons would disappear if Pidgin could simply
 display different icons based on the combination of messenger/screen name
 and protocol that tends to signify our identities and how we met others.
 However this could require a potentially infinite number of icon sets and
 also require impractical mental or mouseclick effort for users to
 associate different icons with different identities.
 But since we are inherently only one person, and never act differently
 around different people, we need no different identities.
 > The removal of protocol icons appears to be wishful thinking on the
 Ostrich developers part that the world is simpler than it, in fact, is.
 They should put protocol icons back or Pidgin will go the way of MIT LISP
 versus  Bell Labs C like all who prefer abstraction to reality.
 I doubt it. People will use Pidgin either way, but people also use Windows
 even though they try to strong-arm you into thinking their way.

-- 
Ticket URL: <http://developer.pidgin.im/ticket/451#comment:18>
Pidgin <http://pidgin.im>
Pidgin