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I first saw the term hamburger menu several months back and I thought, "huh?" as I had no idea what it meant. I had to go search the net to find out that they meant those three stacked bars. Why not just call it that? It doesn't really look like a hamburger.

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I had to do the same when I first heard it, a sure sign that the metaphor fails, and most of the search results were pieces explaining what a terrible idea it is. Just searched again, yep, nearly all the first page is why you should never implement it, along with BK and a stack exchange "what's the lined menu icon called".

Better question, why not just stick with a GUI element that can be described succinctly? A gear perhaps.

If the top Google results all tell you that you shouldn't do it, then why do so many people do it?

In fact I'm writing this on Firefox, which has one of those things in the browser UI...

Hamburger menu is a good short-hand when talking about UI with someone who already knows the terms.

Similar to lots of other technical or jargon terms, it's not a good description for a (new) user.

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