Interesting read. I know I've certainly got strong opinions on design and enjoy reading about it though I'm not a designer by trade.
Amazing that it didn't cover some of the greats, particularly The Pepsi Gravitational Field (PDF discussed is available here. I'd wager it's because it's often easy to tear down all the grand exultations and perambulations about why, exactly, a slightly lighter shade of blue is a revolution in design when in fact the justifications are often fabricated out of whole cloth in order to make the client feel better about spending a lot of money on something simple and obvious. I do think there's a lot of dislike of change for change's sake. I remember the uproar when my own alma mater switched from a loyal dog to a weasel. The weasel logo grew on me eventually, but I'm happy to see it gone. I suspect a lot of it is related to identity. Brands want to constantly reinvent themselves; fans of the brand want things to stay frozen in time. Consider: coats-of-arms don't change. Neither do flags. We want history and every time that history is erased, some part of our emotional investment in that brand is betrayed. Apropos of nothing, one of my favorite youtube videos of all time:
Yeah, I believe there are countless examples of storied logos that we are familiar with and have a strong emotional bias against seeing changed. I bet in the majority of those cases where the brand has been around for a while if you look back at the history of the logo you'd see obviously dated, grimace inducing designs that just make you frown a little inside when you see them as you go back in time. Your school's logo is a prime example. Looking at it dispassionately you can clearly see a progression backward where the logo becomes increasingly out of touch and dated, almost to the point of being comical going all the way back. But I bet at every single point of change along the way, too many people presently engaged with the brand felt that changing their logo was a bridge to far...even if the trend towards refreshing relevance in logo evolution was crystal clear to them up to that point. I guess that's the whole point though to some extent. Brands want us to identify with them desperately. If we don't have some sort of emotional reaction to what we identify closely with changing on us, than the brand hasn't been as successful as it could have been up to that point. The holy grail for brands would be to have the reaction skew positive while they tuck the nostalgia away in their back pocket for use in some clever marketing years in the future. I'm trying to think of the last time I was into a brand enough to notice the design/logo change, and really like it. I know there must be something but it isn't jumping out at me. Also, I am only on page 6 of The Pepsi Gravitational Field and my jaw is in my lap. Given that the original comment says it gets better towards the end....I don't even know where to begin...as funny as it is, if this were my profession I think this document would just make me intensely angry. Luckily I'm not and it's easily the funniest thing I've read in a month. I mean, page 6 documenting the origin of intellectual property...where do you even go from there?I do think there's a lot of dislike of change for change's sake.
A friend of mine was at Avenue A/Razorfish when the Pepsi logo came through. She couldn't vouch for the authenticity of the document, but she said that she'd seen some of the images before in internal discussions. It surprised none of my design friends. Work with architects or designers long enough and you will start seeing everything in terms of golden means.
I'm having a hard time with it too. I totally get reverence for the golden ratio (an idea who's virtues I was skeptical about when I first learned about it in art class...at least to the degree with which it was praised) coming from the design crowd. That document just went so far beyond. If I had to put drinking money on it I'd say it wasn't real but hope my friends weren't thirsty.She couldn't vouch for the authenticity of the document,