Yahoo! Does It Again… But We’re Not Sure What ‘It’ Is!

Yahoo! has been on a really great run lately. They've launched a whole bunch of new features and products, acquired some smaller companies, and managed to turn their company around financially. But it's so hard to tell what "It" is.

This week's announcement of the Yahoo! logo change — the signature exclamation point turned into a purple area — is just another example of that confusion. The new logo will represent all that's good about Yahoo!, while still retaining its uniqueness as one of the most recognizable logos in technology history.

Yes, Yahoo! has always had a purple logo. But it's always been some shade of purple, not "Royal Purple," which is a trademarked color that belongs to the DuPont chemical company. Or so they say. Because it's hard to find anything on the Internet that uses this color for anything other than old coolers and car parts. So maybe it's an original idea.

So what's new with the logo? Nothing — other than there is no actual purple anywhere in the new design: What you see above is only one of many different iterations of the new logo, so there really isn't much to report on. Besides, we already have an article on this, and the only update is that it's been adjusted to "Royal Purple," just in case that's an actual color.

One has to wonder why Yahoo! felt the need to create a new logo now, when they've TOLD you about it on their own website. We didn't even know about it ourselves. In fact, not one article from any major tech site caught wind of this yet — even though Yahoo! says this new logo will represent all that's good about Yahoo!. Well, okay.

But isn't this just another case of Yahoo! trying to make a logo for the sake of having something new? Won't they eventually run out of ideas? And won't they be forced to go back to their old purple logo when that happens? (And will that have any effect on whether or not they keep it?) It would be one thing if Yahoo! was different from the others in their approach to logo design — if, say, they had a single focus and ethos about how designs should work.

But Yahoo! seems to be the opposite: design is just one of many random things they can think of. (They even call their logo a "design element.") Sure, they've started a new logo design contest, but it's for their own glory and to make money from the results. They don't need a new logo to serve as an identity for them — they can do that all on their own.

What Yahoo! needs is focus — not focus on who they are, but focus on what they do best. Because, if nothing else, Yahoo!'s latest announcements have shown that they have no idea what it "Is." And neither do we.

Not that we don't think Yahoo! is doing a good job. We're just afraid to find out what It is. And with Yahoo! changing it as often as they do, we might never know.

Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/1869236/yahoo_does_it_again_but_were_not_sure_what_it_is/index.html

Title: The Yahoo! Design-a-thon Contest… Er… Contest

In the holy lands of California, a group of tech-minded men and women gathered together in prayer for the greater glory of their company and the betterment of their world.

Conclusion: we need a new logo.

With such a declaration, the Yahoo! Design-a-thon Contest was born. (That's what they're calling it, anyway. They're really calling it the Design-a-thon Contest.)

The contest is like any other design contest out there: hopeful designers submit their logos to Yahoo! for consideration. But this contest is different from others in two ways:

1) There's no prize money at stake. You might be asking, "Why do I care about some stupid logo contest if I'm not going to be getting any money?" And that's a fair question. Well, you should care because this isn't just "some stupid logo contest.