Comment by atoav

As someone who worked in IT support icons can be award winning and you'd still find people who will have a hard time understanding their meaning when there is a label written underneath them. People are lazy and don't read text in computer programs. Sit next to a user who clicked away a warning and ask them what it said.

As a former freelance graphic/web designer I'd argue that the style of icon is much less important than the organization of those icons. E.g. some software will put 50 icons seemingly randomly into a toolbar and let you play a game of "find the right one". The quality of every single icon becomes utterly meaningless then as the organizing principle is wrong.

That means first an icon bas to be the right choice and be used in the right context, then we can talk about readability and how well it clicks and stylistic questions come dead last. Some people think graphic design is about coming up with cool looking styles. That is literally the opposite of what good graphic design is.