Why You Hate Google’s New Logo
henever a brand wants to freshen itself up, you start hearing talk about “clean lines,” as if a few gorgeous, old-fashioned letters were keeping us in the Dark Ages. Google’s new logo, announced and unveiled this week, is the latest victim. Its old logo’s typeface—reminiscent of literature, newspapers, printing—had a reassuring hint of history, paying its respects to what it had come to improve upon and replace. The letters’ literary old serifs were subtly authoritative: the sturdy, handsome “G,” the stately, appealing little “oo,” the typewriterish, lovable “g,” the elegant “l,” the thoughtful “e.”
.. Google took something we trusted and filed off its dignity
.. When I see that shifty new rainbow-colored “G” bookmarked on my toolbar, I recoil with mild distrust, thinking of when Philip Morris became Altria—No cigarettes here, see? Just rainbows!—or when British Petroleum suggested we think of it as Beyond Petroleum, or when the Bush Administration would name something Freedom.
.. Let this sans-serif building-block refrigerator-magnet silliness be the New Coke to your Coke