David,
you got one thing right:
> but I think what is really being
> talked about here is using the profile of an image, rather than its
> internal structure, to recognize it.
but you failed to develop the theme, presumably you agree that the
profile of an image is helpful in identifying it?
this may merit being a guideline.
W3C icons are notorious for their use of text, and self-similarity,
with a few happy exceptions.
It was some while ago that i mentioned that it might be helpful if the
blue link borders were not rectilinear, but followed the profile, and
even went so far as to find examples.
png would be a useful format, your point regarding aliasing is well
taken, however for many small icons it's algorithms are far from
efficient, in comparison say with gif, or jpg.
for instance
can you improve on this rather appalling comparison, the png is ~10x
the size and for most sites this is just not acceptable. you'll
appreciate that for peepo.com it is out of the question?
thanks
jonathan
