
What Makes a Great Logo – Four Critical Qualities That Nobody Talks About - xTWOz
https://medium.com/swlh/what-makes-a-great-logo-c7b0e8c4b9e3
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tabtab
Sorry, but in my opinion the "Ind Luck" logo is no good. First, I don't even
know what it says: is the second word "Luck" or "Buck" or "Cluck" or what?
Second, it's too busy; it's what I see when I've had too many beers and can't
focus my eyes. Third, reels of film are obsolete. Use a camera profile if you
want a visual of a tool that's still being used.

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Zanni
It says "mindfuck." I thought it was an accidental "fuck" at first, then saw
the "m" in "mind," then found the confirmation in the text. Agreed it's very
busy and hard to parse visually. And ugly. An unfortunate example to end with.

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tabtab
Cussing? Okay, make that 4 reasons it's bad, not 3. When I cuss on Hacker
News, I usually lose moderation points.

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DonHopkins
Pro tip: Try to keep the swastika:penis ratio below 0.25.

[https://boingboing.net/2019/01/16/slacks-new-logo-is-a-
playd...](https://boingboing.net/2019/01/16/slacks-new-logo-is-a-playdoh.html)

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stone-monkey
Cheap swipes like this article really bug me. It's fostering snide comments
and continuing the negative connotation with the manji symbol which was a
religious symbol predating its nazi appropriation. If a company were to have
the angled swastika displayed prominently in their logo, then sure - but not
only is this not the case, but it's also just white space that they're
projecting their prejudices on. I don't think there's anything wrong with
criticism, but sometimes I feel like instead of contributing anything valuable
to the internet, the majority of writers on these media sites are paid to
either shit on things or to advertise it.

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DonHopkins
Professional logo designers should be expected to screen their work for
swastikas and penises, or at least offer a refund or discount if any (or
several) of them accidentally sneak through into the final design.

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projektfu
Let's talk about what makes a great logo. _Shows the exact classic examples
everyone talks about._ Now look at these logos! _Shows two mediocre logos and
calls them good._ See what I mean?

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athenot
Another important one:

The "faxable" criteria. This really means that it degrades well, down to
single color, poor resolution, with noise, and yet still retains its
recognition. Even if we intend the logo to only be used on screens, it helps
distill the simplicity into something the brain easily remembers.

I'll disagree with the article about the ability of users to reproduce it.
Logos are about branding, mental association and to some degree,
identification between the person and the brand. Many popular logos have
strong mind presence in people who are yet completely unable to reproduce it;
"they know it when they see it".

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mreome
There is also a practical advantage to this quality. Even if initially it's
"only be used on screens" there are always going to be new places a company
wants to put their logo, having it 'degrade' well means that the logo will
maintain readability/recondition in many more situation. Business cards,
letterhead, awards, shirts, all kinds of company 'swag'... if you can print it
on a mini-kickball and it's still recognizable after it's half worn off...
that's a winner.

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snowwrestler
The most important feature of your logo is that it have the name of your
company in easily readable text.

A HUGE percentage of even the largest companies in the world have their name
as part of their corporate logo.

Is your company bigger and better known than Disney, Microsoft, Verizon, Ford,
Amazon, or Facebook? If not, you should probably think twice about whether
your arcane little graphic will be enough for your customers (and even more
importantly your _prospective_ customers) to confidently ID and recall your
brand. All those companies incorporate their name in their logo to this day.

Even the companies who can get away with just the graphic now--like Nike,
Apple, McDonalds, etc.--started out with a logo that incorporated their name,
in some cases for decades.

Here's the truth: text-free logos are the rare exception, and can't be
confidently predicted. Your logo's job is to help people remember your brand
name. Focus on that, and then, maybe, if the stars align, you can one day take
off the text. But that should be an aspiration, not a design constraint on day
one.

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notahacker
Possibly they're not talked about because, other than the notion of
cohesiveness, they're relatively unimportant compared with "fits perceived
image of company", and sometimes entirely the wrong thing to prioritise.

Sure, Nike and adidas and McDonalds have logos which are easily hand drawn
from memory, as does the average geometric shape stuck above the text in a
half-assed 99designs submission. On the other hand, Coca Cola and KFC are
really, really hard to draw properly and yet equally widely remembered and
admired (an easy to draw shape also matters a lot less for a logo mostly
printed on bottle labels and boxes and meant to convey fidelity to tradition
than it does for one cut out of shoe leather and meant to look sleek in
motion)

Being _remarkable_ is nice to aspire to, and yet there's nothing remarkable
about the Nike or Pepsi logos cited (and whilst you could definitely make a
case that the McDonalds "golden arches" logo is, most people familiar with the
brand have never seen the architecture of the outlet that inspires it)

And of course, founder CEOs can be as self-aware about the relative
unimportance of their own sense of aesthetics as manager CEOs

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josefresco
Nitpicking but ..."Quality 3: The Founder Should Like It" is more about
getting the logo approved (for a designer) and less about what makes great
logo.

Then there's this "This means the designer is responsible for convincing the
founder that their solution is the right one."

I found this funny because 25% of my job is usually convincing the client that
my designs are good, despite their own (admittedly) bad taste/poor decisions.

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karmakaze
_most great entrepreneurs, know how to select and trust talented people_

Logos or not, this is the elusive character that I've been unconsciously
seeking at companies. Whenever there is a significant mis-estimation or
placement of talent/trust in upper management there are recurring issues that
are hard to pinpoint. It is not enough to place an amount of trust
commensurate with talent, both must be high for effectiveness.

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piokoch
I am always wondering to what extent logo and company name matter. Google has
rather boring logo yet they are successful. I guess that many people who heard
for the first time about mobile apps framework Xamarin thought "hmm, this must
be some medicine for diarrhea" but still this tool got pretty popular.

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vijay_nair
Logo and Branding are highly dependent on the success of the company than the
other way around. Nike's logo is iconic because of the success of the company,
it's not intrinsic to the shape itself. This is something I have to remind all
my clients who send me a brief that essentially boils down to "Make me a
billon-dollar logo."¹

I then have to remind them that the only way to do that is to actually build a
company worth a billion dollars in revenue, then open Photoshop and draw a
random squiggle.

¹Most common one is, "I need the logo to be world-class, like Apple or
Microsoft."

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queercode
Suggesting that "every product, restaurant, and company [having] the exact
same label set in the same type with the same colours" is a "Marxist dream" is
totally not how that works, though.

