Google Chrome Got SAL 9000’s Eye

Posted by Alex in Blog & Internet on September 5, 2008 at 3:36 pm


By now you’ve all probably been playing with Google Chrome, the search engine giant’s new browser (well, unless you’re on a Mac or Linux, that is). Well, Philipp Lenssen’s Google Blogoscoped blog who broke the news on the whole thing has a really neat list of tips and pointers on Chrome.

One thing that many people are wondering about is what’s up with Google Chrome’s logo? Philipp thinks that it’s a combination of Pokémon’s Poké Ball, and the Simon toy (see also this post on Digital Inspiration)

Well, I say there’s something else. See that glowing blue eye? It’s absolutely, positively from SAL 9000, the Earthbound twin of the HAL 9000 computer in Arthur C. Clarke’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. (Huh? There are two of ‘em? Yep: HAL has a red eye, SAL has a blue eye.)

And here’s a YouTube clip of SAL 9000 (voiced by Candice Bergen, actually) from 2010: The Year We Make Contact (based on Clarke’s 2010: Odyssey Two)


[YouTube clip]



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COMMENT

14 comments to "Google Chrome Got SAL 9000’s Eye"

  1. Peeves
    September 5th, 2008 at 4:29 pm

    Yeah..a bad logo based on a bad movie.

  2. Johnny Cat
    September 5th, 2008 at 4:34 pm

    I thought Simon immediately, I get Pokeball, and I think it’s a good call by Alex on the SAL eye.

    But with all that rainbow color going on, why the name “Chrome”? That’s just puzzling.

  3. Courageous Grace
    September 5th, 2008 at 5:05 pm

    I thought of…

    Halo.

    http://nerdad.blogspot.com/2008/09/google-browser.html

  4. MisterDevious
    September 5th, 2008 at 6:21 pm

    “There are 26 references in the current encyclopedia” in 2010. Funny, Wikipedia circa 2008 has over 150. Must be some heavy-duty pruning coming up.

  5. Bill Webb
    September 5th, 2008 at 7:00 pm

    Johnny Cat:
    Chrome is developer talk for the space where the browser interfaces with the content. Since the object of Google Chrome is to optimize that area, it seemed like a good name.

  6. chet
    September 5th, 2008 at 7:03 pm

    anyone else think aperture science?

  7. ted
    September 5th, 2008 at 8:09 pm

    Haven’t tried it yet.
    Chrome’s a dumb name.
    Maybe we should have a naming contest.

  8. blacklaser
    September 6th, 2008 at 12:20 am

    it look more like the metroid game, samus in the morph ball position.

  9. dan00
    September 6th, 2008 at 3:12 am

    I think Philipp is right. Everything is metaphorical about the Chrome logo. Google and Firefox logos because a lot of the source code is taken from Firefox, Webcam because Google servers are actually monitoring a lot of your activity on their browser, Simon game because soon enough Google will know everything about you through their browser and therefore control you in many ways (as in make you play their game) and the Pokemon ball because you will become Googles minions.
    The end. :)

  10. luis c
    September 6th, 2008 at 8:51 am

    senores estoy muy agradecido por tanbuenos videos y chistes que envian asi lapaso muy vien me rio solo abeses los amigos disen que estoy loco oye los cerdos me isieron acordar dela broma que dise asi que el marrano ba adelante hasta el matadero disen las biejas y que tal el fumador comchudito no grcias

  11. Absent
    September 6th, 2008 at 10:00 am

    And you thought Skynet was bad. Chrome is the start of the end of civilisation. Quick, everyone rebel before we’re living on the planet of the apes.

  12. Bert
    September 6th, 2008 at 10:58 am

    The Chrome-Logo looks a lot like the Windows Media Player-Logo…

  13. Dave(TheRealPayback)
    September 7th, 2008 at 11:08 am

    I notice the first thing Chandra googled was call of duty…

  14. design
    September 16th, 2008 at 1:55 pm

    The Simon reference is much deeper upon analysis than at face value. Everyone’s playing along to Google’s newest game.


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