I'm guessing if you are in game chat, nobody knows what icon you have or care. If they see it in channel, will they really care still or even look to remember? We are getting a little to icon heavy in my opinion. I highly doubt most people will care, to be honest.
The one thing I wish I could fix is, when people join GOW who are "noobs" but are just chop players, with thousands of games, trying to play GOW. Those people shouldn't be booted and I think people misinterpret them for noobs. I wish chop players would join and say, hey I'ma chop player trying to learn GOW. I bet that would decrease 80% of kicks, in my opinion.
Honestly, I'd play chop if I could, to help the community be more active. I don't know it and never really play, it but I'm told I can't watch due to the format of the map and how, I assume, I would be in the way. Which makes sense. I can watch replays but playing it vs watching is a big difference. I'm sure people are the same with GOW.