Picons are an old idea that can be new again. A picon is a personal icon. Much like the favicon created for a site or blog, the picon is for yourself. Another chance to use the popular self branding plan. Have you already got a picon which you use to represent yourself, an avatar? If so, just shrink it down to be icon sized.
From a FAQ about picons – They’re small, constrained images used to represent users and domains on the net, organized into databases so that the appropriate image for a given e-mail address can be found. Besides users and domains, there are picons databases for Usenet newsgroups and weather forecasts. The picons are in either monochrome XBM format or color XPM and GIF formats. Picons in all formats are constrained to be 48 by 48 pixels in size.
Steve Kinzler has the Picon FAQ which is linked above and a Picons archive on his site. The FAQ was last updated in 2005. Seems we could be bringing picons back into fashion. Picon yourself today!
