The internet has shape preferences, and they’re more meaningful than you think

On Thursday, Twitter threw us a curveball (sorry) and smoothed out the once-square avatar photos into orbs floating around the timeline. The change is notable, but the circle vs. square debate is far from new. There are arguments in favor of both when applied to internet design; circles indicate a person rather than content, which typically comes in a grid-like shape. So what is the current state of shapes on the social web?

We often hear indexes explained using the analogy of an index in the back of a book. You want to find the information about “rabbits” for instance – and so you look that up in the back and find the list of pages that talk about rabbits.