[OSM-talk] new logo

[Richard Fairhurst]

Robert Martinez wrote:
> Now, could everybody still in doubt please do a simple google 
> image search for "good logo" and check for logos that tell a story! 
> I bet you'll hardly find any.

Robert, I think you have produced a good logo. Not an outstanding one, like
(to quote two of my favourites) British Waterways' evocative
bridge-and-bulrushes
(http://www.britishwaterways.co.uk/media/images/logo_bw.gif), or Factory
Records' wonderfully stylised 1980s effort
(http://seandodson.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/factory_records.jpg). But a
perfectly decent logo.

But please, please stop patronising people by assuming they know nothing
about design. OpenStreetMap is a more catholic community than you might
think: it's not just all 18-year old Linux geeks (not that there's anything
wrong with 18-year old Linux geeks). There _are_ people here who are
qualified to have an opinion on your logo.

I'm a magazine editor. Part of my job is assessing the work our designers
come up with, and saying "yes, this is good", or "no, this doesn't work", or
"hm, ok, but this aspect needs reworking" - like when we redesigned our
entire magazine about six months ago. There are some OSM contributors who
work at design studios; I know of at least one occasional contributor who
has retired after many years in print design. Not everyone is a
stereotypical hacker.

So when you say:

> So what I offer also is a reduction in quantity, while the old logo 
> has a map with folds, a magnifying glass with reflections, a 
> digital representation, forrest, streets and a lake on the map.
> So I partly understand you feel kind of robbed, because my logo 
> has only a pin on a map.

remember that I, and others, don't object to a simple logo. A simple logo
works brilliantly in the two examples I cited above.

But yours is the wrong simple logo. It's a good logo, but it's not a good
logo for OSM. I'm sure you could design a great logo for OSM - it's just
this one isn't it.

Having a pin on a map is not what OSM is about. I was going to be facetious
and say "you might as well have a frog on a map", but actually a frog might
be better. There are hundreds of sites that are about placing pins on
(Google) maps. We're not one of them.

Simple logos can tell a story. The British Waterways logo conjures
associations of hump-backed bridges (which every British motorist, and
therefore 90% of the target audience, has driven across) - a simple,
authentic industrial heritage - and of nature. Perfect for evoking the
canals. The Factory Records logo conjures associations of 20th century
industrial design and the 1968 riots - a brilliant evocation of the Factory
attitude and its ventures such as the Hacienda. These are the right stories
to tell. The pin logo conjures associations of Platial (RIP) and Frappr
(RIP) and Wikimapia (still-born), and those aren't the right associations
for OSM.

It's nothing personal nor an aspersion on your design skills. Our designer
at work is great but I still sometimes send pages back to him saying "this
doesn't work". Actually one such design did have pushpins on but that's
coincidence. :)

cheers
Richard
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