Microsoft Unveils First New Company Logo In 25 Years 378
Barence writes "For the first time in 25 years, Microsoft has issued a new company logo to usher in the Windows 8 era. Made up of a newly square Windows symbol alongside grey Microsoft logo type, it's been designed to closely match the logos for other products in Microsoft's portfolio, including Office and Xbox. The logo takes pride of place on Microsoft.com from today, and will be used in Microsoft's retail stores and on all future TV ads."
Unimaginative (Score:5, Insightful)
Apparently this is the "less is more" philosophy... but at the same time, it is plain and unimaginative. Isn't it bad for a company that aims to prove that they can reinvent themselves?
Another fugly design from the marketing droids (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Better Article (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, and let me be the first to say, I think they went backwards.
That logo belongs in the 80s. I'm saying this as a graphic designer too; The colors are flat, solid. It uses simple geometric shapes. The only thing that tells me that this isn't vintage is the kerning on the text at the end (they overlapped the crossbar on the 'f' and 't'), which wasn't terribly common in that day. And yes, I am saying this knowing the design house that created the logo (very disappointed, Pentagram... you're supposed to be the best here. Da fuq happened?).
I know it was designed to evoke feelings of openness and friendliness, but to me it just comes off as dated. But maybe I'm jaded because I know that Microsoft OS' follow the same rule as Star Trek movies: Every other one sucks. And maybe I am being harsh on Pentagram; I mean, it's hard to design a logo for something you know is going to explode on the launchpad.
But still guys, it's pretty 80s. You could have at least... I don't know... tilted the squares a little? Something. Anything. It's very boring.
Re:Stop laughing (Score:4, Insightful)
The designer must of taken a whole lunch break to create it.
Mayhaps but, you know it went something like..
Hey we need a new logo
Send out the RFP
Receive hundreds if not thousand of submissions, most of them decidedly silly
Spend hours upon days upon weeks of LSERs (Logo Submission Evaluation Reviews) to narrow the field
Toss that into the pot and go with an Execs 5yo did in crayon
25 years worth of work... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Looks like Metro tiles (Score:5, Insightful)
Either that or they could get rid of Ballmer!
Hey, shut up! Don't give them any ideas! I'm personally enjoying watching this trainwreck unfold.
Re:Better Article (Score:5, Insightful)
Bah. Pentagram made a Windows 8 logo. Look at the one on their own homepage by Paula Scher, their lead designer and goddess in the design world -- monochrome, baby blue, sans serif font, angled rectangles. That looked modern.
Logos are supposed to look simple, they're symbols; and should be easily recognizable and (ideally) capable of being used in black and white. Anyone who's taken a semester of graphic design classes could tell you that much.
And don't say companies don't live or die based on their logos: Brand identity is what separates Pepsi from Coke. I won't get into the research and market data that says how important this is, but it is and you're making a huge mistake to think otherwise.
Re:Launched? Unveiled? (Score:5, Insightful)
Damn, there's some awful optical illusions going on there... Gray dot in the middle, faint lines of off colors equidistant from the white separator bars in each of the color boxes.
Maybe it's just the poor quality of JPG?
Re:poor (Score:5, Insightful)
One of the interesting things about this is the amount of money spent to create this logo. It probably runs into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Internally, they probably went through multiple design revisions, followed by multiple meetings on how the logo should look and what the brand "evokes", followed by multiple meetings at the very top of the company to confirm these findings. And that's if it was done internally; if they hired an agency to do this it could easily have cost them millions.
All for something I could have done with Powerpoint.
Re:poor (Score:2, Insightful)
One might say AVG did the ripping off of colours some years ago.
Re:Better Article (Score:4, Insightful)
However, when it comes to Microsoft Server software and say Linux server software, these are two very different products with a vast array of differences and relative positives and negatives. The people in charge of choosing whether a database server gets Windows Server 2008 and SQL Server or Linux and MySQL is going to be looking at up-times, security, compatibility, and so on. The point I'm trying to make is that the branding of a company is definitely more important for some companies than others and soda especially is an example of where branding is hugely important, business software, not so much.
Re:poor (Score:4, Insightful)
Good simple logos are hard to do.
Bad simple logos are easy to do. Like this one. Or do you see something good about it?
Once again, major props to Steve Ballmer for keeping that impressively steady hand on the tiller, straight towards the rocks.
Re:poor (Score:5, Insightful)
All for something I could have done with Powerpoint.
Piece of chalk $0.05
Knowing where to make the mark $5000
The tools used does not determine the difficulty of the project.