The Google Browser Comic

Google is working on something called Google Chrome. In short, it is how Google is going to fix the browser. Take a look for yourself, this looks mighty interesting.

Update: Zyb said that my initial post was pretty lame (read the comment below)... and I agree. Because...

Google have conveyed pretty techie stuff in an understandable and entertaining way, while at the same time generating enthusiasm for the product to be. Of course, this is not my words, but what Zyb said (and again - he is right).

Using comics to explain very complex tasks is nothing new. It has proven to be a very effective way to make complexity simple - and even better - to make people get the point quickly. I have used "comic" style illustration a couple of times.

In 2006 I had to visualize how disorganized and wasteful 40 designer was saving files (everyone used their own made-up file structure, and none had any idea were something else was). I did this by creating a small comic (not as good as Google's though), where I illustrated just have many steps, and how many people a person had to see, in order to find a group of files that he needed to send to a client.

I then, still in comic mode, illustrated just how easy this would be if we centralized this process, and introduced automation to speed up intermediary tasks.

The effect was instant understanding, and none were able to argue against it.

But perhaps the most famous use of comics, to convey complex tasks, is the work of Larry Gonick. He has created many books about history, genetics, statistics, environment etc (see them here), and all of them conveys very complex things in an easy to understand comic.

Note: In 2005 he gave a one hour talk about how this works at Stanford University, but it is no longer available.

Another good example is "[something] in plain English", the series by The Common Craft Show. While it isn't actually in the form of a comic, it is very similar in nature.

(via Google Blogoscoped)