There were basically two main geezas who wrote competing theories back in the day, they were a linguist named Ferdinand de Saussure and a philosopher called Charles Sanders Peirce.

Saussure’s theory split a sign into two specific parts called the ‘Signifier’ which relates to the object or substance of the sign and the ‘Signified’ which refers to the meaning behind the sign. So a sign hanging in a shop window with the word ‘Open’ on it breaks down like this: the word open is the signifier while the signified concept is that the shop is open for business.

Peirce broke signs down into several different parts. The ‘Sign Vehicle’ (the form of the sign), the ‘Sence’ (the sence made of the sign) and the ‘Referant’ (what the sign stands for). Peirce thought that when looking at a sign the viewer would envisage in their mind a secondary sign that was related in some way to the first, cementing the meaning of the first through the fimiliarity and relationship with the second.

I will be using a combination of the theories cooked up by the old boys and more modern takes on simbeology to construct the intuitive icons and symbols for my video interface.

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/index.cfm?forumid=15

http://board.flashkit.com/board/

http://www.actionscript.org/forums/index.php3

http://www.airtightinteractive.com/projects/tiltviewer/app/