- Why is the pause button two lines?
- Why is the play button a triangle?
- Why does the pause button look like that?
Why is the pause button two lines?
PAUSE symbol
But what about the symbol itself? In written poetry two vertical lines denote a pause in the middle of a verse — effectively a type of punctuation. These two vertical lines are known as a caesura mark and are also seen in musical notation displayed as oblique lines similar to two // slashes.
Why is the play button a triangle?
Where Play Came From. The short answer is no one really knows. Gizmodo says that it's from the 1960s when audiovisual was still reel-to-reel. The idea back then was that the triangle actually was an arrow, indicating which way the reel went, but this is pretty much just speculation.
Why does the pause button look like that?
The Pause symbol was designed as a combination of the existing square Stop symbol and the caesura, and was intended to evoke the concept of an interruption or "stutter stop".