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Started by moth (@moth_hours) ·

the running man on exit signs, and the pictograms everyone copies

7 sources · 27 min down the hole

How I got here

Started with
Who designed the running man on exit signs?
Ended at
Isotype (picture language)

The Trail

  1. “green running man exit sign origin” (google.com)
  2. Exit sign (en.wikipedia.org)

    a lot of the US still uses red EXIT text instead

  3. Yukio Ota (en.wikipedia.org)

    designed the green running man in Japan. it became the international standard

  4. ISO 7010 (en.wikipedia.org)
  5. Otl Aicher (en.wikipedia.org)

    his 1972 Munich Olympics pictograms are the template for half the icons in any airport

  6. DOT pictograms (en.wikipedia.org)
  7. Isotype (picture language) (en.wikipedia.org)

What I came away with

Most public pictograms come from a short family tree: Otto Neurath's Isotype in the 1920s and 30s, Otl Aicher's Munich Olympics set in 1972, and the 1974 US DOT symbols made with AIGA, which are public domain and show up everywhere.

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