OT: UCal Falls Victim to Building the Brand
Since we're a board of conservative people who hate change, I present UCal's amazing misstep in branding. Their logo change:
Frozen loading bar or flushing toilet, you decide. Whatever it is, it isn't higher education. At the end of the day, let us just be thankful that Dave Brandon has yet to hire the design firm who performed this fuckup.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:44 PM ^
December 12th, 2012 at 3:59 PM ^
I think he overdoes it with the block M. They're on the bathroom placards in Crisler for crying out loud.
December 12th, 2012 at 7:53 PM ^
Brandon or someone in the IP area at Michigan wants the block M to be unequivocally associated with the University of Michigan. It is a very smart move. As for displaying the M in too many places, that is another matter. Personally, I never get tired of seeing it.
December 12th, 2012 at 8:02 PM ^
Yeah, I never tire of it either. The school hasn't been completely uniform about using it though; the new bus stop area by the dental school has the old split M.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:42 PM ^
This logo brought to you courtesy of the "airbrush" feature in MS paint.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:48 PM ^
That graphic artist must have some kind of steady hand with the mouse. Whenever I try to use the airbrush on Paint whatever I'm working on turns into a polka dotted mess.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:55 PM ^
Still looks like some medical sign for intestinal discomfort or perhaps a prescription drug logo for some kind of pill that clears up the drippy shits.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:43 PM ^
Yeah, it sucks, but the firm that made it is now a Legend and a Leader.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:42 PM ^
Looks like a coiler in a toilet bowl.
December 12th, 2012 at 4:00 PM ^
Image please!
December 12th, 2012 at 8:45 PM ^
Seriously? Is that like, a fetish, or what's going on there?
December 13th, 2012 at 9:23 AM ^
and lots of piping I've found you need to pick things up whenever possible.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:43 PM ^
Doesn't that mean the school is in the Southern Hemisphere? Or is it the other way 'round in reverse?
December 12th, 2012 at 2:56 PM ^
Let's have Bart make a few calls to find out.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:43 PM ^
It looks more like something you would see on TV while watching Reading Rainbow after you just ate a handful of mushrooms.
#nevertriedit
December 13th, 2012 at 11:45 AM ^
I hate when that happens.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:50 PM ^
The CAL logo is used only by UC Berkeley's athletics department. Both the old seal and new toilet bowl logos in the OP's post are University-of-California-wide, meaning all 8 campuses, and aren't sports-related.
As a current Cal student, I went to sign the petition against the new logo at change.org and discovered that 47,000 people had already signed it. The new logo is a failure of truly epic proportions.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:12 PM ^
Oh, I thought this was in regards to Berkeley itself. Regardless, I have signed the petition as well, the new logo is terrible.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:54 PM ^
Student at UC Davis here. I second this.
Are non-students allowed to sign the petition as well? If so, please, MgoCrew, help us.
/Insert "Noooooo!" picture here
December 12th, 2012 at 2:45 PM ^
This goes outside of the crazy branding thing. Schools doing crazy things for sports logos is a misguided trend. This is the first I am aware of schools doing this crazy stuff with the actual school seal. Congrats on Cal taking bad design taste to a new dimension.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:48 PM ^
it looks like something that a medieval knight would wear on the front of his armor during a joust. So I guess it is pretty cool....
December 15th, 2012 at 3:59 PM ^
with something that I could paint?
December 15th, 2012 at 6:05 PM ^
December 12th, 2012 at 2:52 PM ^
...posted some select tweets on the subject. I tend to like this one:
"I think my internet connection is down because it looks like the #UCLogo is still loading #sayitaintso #bringbacktheoldUClogo.”"
To me, it looks like the last corn chip in the bag, which is probably what inspired the intern who I would imagine designed this one.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:55 PM ^
Another random OT since I have you here. I have this utility pole kind of near my house that has been lying on the grass strip between the street and sidewalk for over a year (and it is killing the grass). Do I call the city or DTE?
December 12th, 2012 at 2:59 PM ^
I would call it into us...800-477-4747. If it has been a year or so, then it may very well have been for something like a maintenance job that was either lessened in scope or cancelled altogether (or put off because of everyone's friend - the budget). It might get sent to my group for followup to confirm that it isn't part of something that is eventually supposed to happen. If you get no action, let me know somewhere (here, Twitter, etc...) and I know someone at the pole yard who can take care of it.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:05 PM ^
Do the guys at the pole buy lightly used ones (say ~1 year old and just sat on grass) and what do they pay? Gotta fund these oversea trips somehow.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:08 PM ^
Depending on the size, we pay something on the order of $400-$600 per pole ourselves, and one year - for what we expect as a useful life - leads to negligible decpreciation. That might be a good start for the ensuing negotiation. It isn't common now, but farmers used to buy the poles that we replaced from us and make fences from them back in the day - definitely do not recommend burning them as firewood, of course.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:16 PM ^
My wife is of the view it would be hilarious to cut say eighteen inches off the top and when they finally do set it up, see long it takes them figure out why is shorter. While I agree that might be funny, the part where AAPD drops by to ask me what I've been doing with my power tools at 1 am would be a lot less funny.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:22 PM ^
I can relate to the last part - as someone who once designed a job that was done off-hours and without the proper permitting with regard to Ann Arbor's noise ordnance (actually had to appear in court for that one, represented by the company, of course), I can say without hesitation that the police would not find it amusing.
December 12th, 2012 at 4:23 PM ^
This hijacking has so much win in it. Its a serious discussion about something that probably has never been discussed in MGoHistory. Tremendous!
December 15th, 2012 at 4:03 PM ^
"Fear the Toilet Bowl" would be intimidating cheer to shout at opposing fans. Mostly the really drunk ones.
December 12th, 2012 at 2:57 PM ^
December 12th, 2012 at 3:19 PM ^
Before clicking on the thread, I was trying to figure out what school he was talking about.
December 12th, 2012 at 6:15 PM ^
As pointed out, he is not talking about 1 school, but the Cal system of U. (heh).
UC Davis
UC Berkeley
UC LA
UC Santa Cruz
and uhhh others
December 12th, 2012 at 6:20 PM ^
UC San Diego
UC Irvine
UC Merced
UC Riverside
UC SF
UC Santa Barbara
December 13th, 2012 at 4:33 AM ^
The real question is: do Jim Delany and Co have "B2G" copyrighted yet?
With the trend towards super-sizing conferences, I suspect he's gonna need it in the near future.
December 13th, 2012 at 9:38 AM ^
December 12th, 2012 at 3:12 PM ^
I've seen worse
December 12th, 2012 at 7:19 PM ^
I'm choosing to believe that is a man staring at a basketball on his knee.
December 13th, 2012 at 10:35 AM ^
Holy Cats. That is... well. Simultanously awful and wonderful.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:22 PM ^
The logo isn't loading. Just a weird blue shape with a yellow "loading" signal.
December 12th, 2012 at 3:35 PM ^
the seal is changing, but it is a more of a refinement:
they are not just getting rid of it.
i think that we all get riled up here because we see something at the top of the page that is admittedly ugly and think of cal's logo or UCLA or something, but this is a pretty amazingly complex organziation that needs to have some sort of unifying graphical element, and while i personally think that the wierd U shape with the C gradient is a swing and miss, it is not like the original thing they are covering up was really inventive. there is a difference between a wordmark, a logo and a seal. this logo needs to work on a million different applications and sizes and colors to act as a shorthand, visual umbrella for the organization.
there is a video here that explains it a bit.
http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/ic_uc_we_all_c_for_california.php