[TYPO3-english] Rebranding: Get the green back

[François Suter]

Hi Martin,

> I watched the keynote of the T3CON. The reason(ing) I heard was:
> "We want to simplify things for you. It's cheaper to print the
> logo on t-shirts and so on with just one color. People would say
> TYPO3 is 'orange'". Did I miss an argument?

Personally I don't mind the change itself. It's true that the logo with 
2 colors was more distinctive, but I don't think the change is so 
dramatic, because we still have the shape, which matters a lot IMO. Nike 
could paint their swoosh any color, you would still recognized the 
brand. Years ago Apple changed its logo from rainbow-colored to white. 
It definitely looks more bland (and I like the flower-power touch of the 
rainbow colors), but it was still very obviously representative of the 
Apple brand.

I don't think we should go back. I think it's rather clever to rely on 
shape for brand recognition rather than color. After all they are quite 
a few color-blind people around, for whom it does not matter as much 
maybe, and it could allow us to change color again if we have some good 
reasons to do so with more ease, as the color would have less 
importance. Somehow it's more future-proof.

Now I'm not entirely happy, because:

- the process leading up to that decision should have been (more) 
transparent: it's not a question of involving all the community, part of 
which would not have been happy anyway, whichever final decision was 
taken. But it would have helped prepare the ground and understand the 
motivation better.
- the reasons are indeed fuzzy: as you mention, the only reason 
highlighted in the keynote was that monochrome was easier to print, in 
particular on t-shirts. This sound so lame. Robert - if you're reading 
this - don't take it personally, but that part of your speech was simply 
laughable. I would guess it's not your fault, maybe some lack of 
preparation, but I sincerely hope that such a major decision was not 
taken simply on the base of printing t-shirts. I'm pretty sure it's not, 
but let's have the whole reasoning then.

Cheers

-- 

Francois Suter
Cobweb Development Sarl - http://www.cobweb.ch