Log's including Pyra that may or may not look like Swastika and the ensuing discussion

[iprice]

It's not the Pyra's task to rehabilitate culture overshadowed by Nazis with the risk of being associated with Nazis itself. It's task is to be a free gaming mini netbook.

It's not about rehabilitating people, but about not being fearful of using similar imagery.

 

[Granitehead]

How would this logo not be instantly recognizable? I don't know of anything I could confuse this with.

-God Ginrai

It's a hexagon filled with lots of lines. That's what you see at the first glance. Show someone (with no previous knownledge, the person doesn't even know the console's name is Pyra) a Pyra prototype (with the logo on the lid), let them examine it properly. Then take the Pyra away and give them 5 hexagons filled with lines and ask them which is the logo.
With a good logo, any variation which changes any of it's meaning instantly makes it a very different logo. With this you can switch the internals around however you want and you still get the same first impression.

Edit:

It's not the Pyra's task to rehabilitate culture overshadowed by Nazis with the risk of being associated with Nazis itself. It's task is to be a free gaming mini netbook.

It's not about rehabilitating people, but about not being fearful of using similar imagery.

Nowhere I was writing about people. I was talking about culture.

 

[Neelix]

Note that I didn't write "there is a Hakenkreuz in there" but "I always end up searching for one", which is a difference. There is no exact Hakenkreuz in it. It just reminds of them. comradekingu's reaction (in a pm - not going to quote it in this case) shows that he himself is aware of the connection - it's based on the same thing the Hakenkreuz is based on. That's no Nazi thing, they just stole it from other people. But sadly that doesn't matter - it will now be associated with Nazis forever.

It doesn't have to be. If similar symbols are used sufficiently in other contexts, then Nazi association will fade with time.

That part of history is now thankfully over and people shouldn't be afraid to create imagery that might include unintentional passing resemblances.

It's not the Pyra's task to rehabilitate culture overshadowed by Nazis with the risk of being associated with Nazis itself.It's task is to be a free gaming mini netbook.

I agree with this, but I see no risk of such an association by having a logo that bares only a vague similarity to a swastika.

Certainly there is nothing more than a vague similarity in any of the logo suggestions so far.

- Neelix

 

[God Ginrai]

With this you can switch the internals around however you want and you still get the same first impression.

Honestly, I don't think that's true. The defining characteristic of this logo is the cross in the center. Without that, it does not look like the same logo at all. Not to mention, I have been supporting the version that separates the letters from the rest. (#21) This makes it more distinct than "just a hexagon filled with lines".

-God Ginrai

 

[comradekingu]

Almost all of comradekingu's logo versions have one thing in common: I don't like them, I don't see the cube in them, I can't read them and I end up searching for the hidden Hakenkreuz all the time.

You bringing up nazi insignia in a thread about my cultural herritage is, along with all the things you mention having in common with yourself, not something i want in my thread.

There are many things hidden in my designs, keep looking, and know what you bring out of it, is no greater than your efforts into looking at it with an open mind.

Keep it constructive, and lead by example. Please edit the post to make it something you would want to read, something that furthers the discussion, or at the very least something i can have use for.

Edit: The last one isn't meant to be an insult, it's just what my mind does when I see the logo, it's very subjective and there is almost no way I can know why (i.e. give information on what would need to be changed to remove that association) - my best guess is that it has something to do with the design being so pointy and angular which I dislike no matter the other associations, it just seems aggressive and unpleasant to me. From there it's not far anymore to Hakenkreuzes which share those associations.

And even without my instinctive dislike of the design, it still looks like a tangled mess to me. It doesn't say anything even if I know what it's supposed to say. It's okay if the message isn't clear to people who don't know it, but if even people who know the message exactly have a hard time figuring out what part is supposed to be what then that crosses the line; it stops being a sophisticated design and starts being a meaningless mess.

That made your post comprehensible to me, thank you. I would argue that readability, and latin letters, are arbritrary to making a visual logo a non-meaningless mess. As that isnt paramount to me in making them, you are very free to judge the outcome, but i feel you arent giving it a chance based on its own merits and rather interpreting outside of its scope. The destinction between sophisticated design, and something that reads first and foremost is mutually exclusive i think. At least it places too many variables outside of my control, and you end up halfway between good font for readability and good design. Which is why dare i say the majority of logos use helvetica or a common non serif font next to something visual. If you read what i wrote earlier you will understand why the process is what it is.

Note that I didn't write "there is a Hakenkreuz in there" but "I always end up searching for one", which is a difference. There is no exact Hakenkreuz in it. It just reminds of them. comradekingu's reaction (in a pm - not going to quote it in this case) shows that he himself is aware of the connection - it's based on the same thing the Hakenkreuz is based on. That's no Nazi thing, they just stole it from other people. But sadly that doesn't matter - it will now be associated with Nazis forever.

But even apart from all abstract associations it's still bad!

A logo should be instantly recognisable. If there are also hidden messages then that's just a bonus, it can't be the only thing.

...

You didnt write one, as in "a" insignia, you wrote "the" initially, and then went on to say I made that connection in a PM, with a fine line of not diving your sentence you imply i based my design upon your interpretation of my logo, based on what you, the singular form, see, and claim the sole interpretation of. The very definition of abstract is reading into it what isnt factually there, that is what you are doing. If im alluring to something its that you dont seem to get the point here. Which is fine, just dont tell others what to think, much like i wont give it away.

How would this logo not be instantly recognizable? I don't know of anything I could confuse this with.

-God Ginrai

It's a hexagon filled with lots of lines. That's what you see at the first glance. Show someone (with no previous knownledge, the person doesn't even know the console's name is Pyra) a Pyra prototype (with the logo on the lid), let them examine it properly. Then take the Pyra away and give them 5 hexagons filled with lines and ask them which is the logo.
With a good logo, any variation which changes any of it's meaning instantly makes it a very different logo. With this you can switch the internals around however you want and you still get the same first impression.

Edit:

It's not the Pyra's task to rehabilitate culture overshadowed by Nazis with the risk of being associated with Nazis itself. It's task is to be a free gaming mini netbook.

It's not about rehabilitating people, but about not being fearful of using similar imagery.

Nowhere I was writing about people. I was talking about culture.

Your view seems to be rooted in that your first impression is stronger than any given content. I dont understand what is different from what we know now to what you present people with in your hypotetical research. I dont know what you see, but the information i put in isnt abstract, which in turn is important to the image as a whole.
What you call culture is very foregin to what I call my own, it is also very much newer, and seems to be, as was pointed out, based on fear.

 

[KickAss]

erm i dont get it.

someone told you your design had a slight resemblance to something else in their eyes and that might cause problems. you gave advice to look at it open minded but would rather keep things you wouldnt want to talk about out of your thread.

i prolly misunderstood.

as was said before there is no hakenkreuz in your logo. no one made any accusations. but i can see the resemblance, too.

in my eyes it looks agressive and dangerous. like some archaic rune.

but thats just my taste, how it works on me. there is no right or wrong here.

in fact i think it is a great piece of work. i just dont like it.

Gesendet von meinem iPhone mit Tapatalk

 

[comradekingu]

I have no problems discussing that, but calling it something it isnt, hakenkreutz instead of how it is used in my culture, when its decided on my behalf that im using it, is giving creedence to a mindset i find disturbingly arrogant.

All my knot type designs share ancestory with celtic and norse, and pan-european common heritage, because that is what I know, who I am. Despite the 1000 year rule of christianity now fading to irrelevance, the culture it seeked to replace still lives on here. The symbol in my avatar is an ground-elf cross, if you maintain the idea that it puts me in connection with something foreign to me, you are demonizing, despite ignorance of what culture that demonizing represents or what culture it tried to eradicate. If celebrating winter solstice is supposedly judeo-christian it would mean judeo-christianism predates itself.

I use the word energy as a means to describe in a way that forces nothing upon anyone what is there. The idea being that what is in someone elses culture, for how they want to view it, is something they have the right to keep. And as such, most any interpretation to do with cultures that share this mutual respect, is equally valid.

 

[Binky]

The point of a logo is to make a positive impression in any/everyone who sees it.

If the overlap between (sees swastika in logo) and (assumes some kind of link with Nazism) is too great, then the logo would be fail at its task.

 

[Klumpen]

You really have to search for it to see some Swastika in it - I do not and wouldn't care either, it's just one of many old sun symbols and I refuse to give stuff like that away to some dead Nazi assholes forever.

The christian cross is an even more simple symbol, that you could see in even more logos if you want, but nobody does.

I did see the Bluetooth resemblance though.

 

[Granitehead]

I think in our communication there were also some problems of language, for example you still misunderstand what I meant with "culture, not people" earlier and I didn't mean the "the vs. a" the way you interpret it but in the way which fits my other statements.

But I'm not going to waste more time here (https://xkcd.com/386/) and instead highlight that I agree with this:

erm i dont get it.

someone told you your design had a slight resemblance to something else in their eyes and that might cause problems. you gave advice to look at it open minded but would rather keep things you wouldnt want to talk about out of your thread.

i prolly misunderstood.

as was said before there is no hakenkreuz in your logo. no one made any accusations. but i can see the resemblance, too.

in my eyes it looks agressive and dangerous. like some archaic rune.

but thats just my taste, how it works on me. there is no right or wrong here.

in fact i think it is a great piece of work. i just dont like it.

He just puts it way nicer than I would.
(I guess that must be my way of discussing, either we discuss long enough to be able to agree on everything {not in the sense of having the same opinion, but in the sense that we know how our premises differ and we agree on the conclusions drawn from each set of premises} or I end up pissing people off.)

 

[KickAss]

your not pissing anyone off. stuff like this happens all the time. communication abides by a different set of rules when carried out over the internet.

there wouldnt have been any problem if you sat vis-a-vis. in general the internet is to blame

Gesendet von meinem iPhone mit Tapatalk

 

[God Ginrai]

You really have to search for it to see some Swastika in it - I do not and wouldn't care either, it's just one of many old sun symbols and I refuse to give stuff like that away to some dead Nazi assholes forever.

The christian cross is an even more simple symbol, that you could see it in even more logos if you want, but nobody does.

I did see the Bluetooth resemblance though.

I agree with this. People tend to find things even when they don't exist... as long as they are looking to find it. No one saw anything resembling a Swastika before T4b made his comment. However, with that now in mind, many people's minds are now unconsciously looking for a Swastika in the logo, because of this suggestion.

It is not that it is easy to see a Swastika, or similar, in this logo, but that you will start to convince yourself you see one once someone tells you to look for one.

If there actually was a Swastika, I would agree that there was room for argument. But the fact of the matter is that there is no Swastika in this logo. Stop trying to find things that aren't there.

-God Ginrai

 

[WizardStan]

If there actually was a Swastika, I would agree that there was room for argument.

https://www.google.ca/search?q=bad+logos&tbm=ischDoesn't matter the intention, sometimes things will just crop up, and as you suggest, once it has been seen it cannot be unseen.

I'm not saying the logo should absolutely avoid every possible negative symbol, but I'm pretty sure we can agree that there are a few images that we could watch out for. Given the Pyra's origin, a swastika is probably one of those. If someone completely unrelated to the project can glance at it and see a swastika then odds are a lot of people will see it, and it only takes one of them to question it.

 

[God Ginrai]

If someone completely unrelated to the project can glance at it and see a swastika then odds are a lot of people will see it, and it only takes one of them to question it.

But as I said. We could spoil any logo in a similar manner.

For example:

Walmart:

Adidas:

Dodge Ram:

twitter:

weightwatchers even has twat in the middle:

We can play these childish games all day, or we can judge a logo on its merit, appeal, and design. Remember, it's not like we're calling the device "The Hitler".

-God Ginrai

 

[WizardStan]

But as I said. We could spoil any logo in a similar manner.

And as I said

I'm not saying the logo should absolutely avoid every possible negative symbol, but I'm pretty sure we can agree that there are a few images that we could watch out for. Given the Pyra's origin, a swastika is probably one of those.

 

[God Ginrai]

But as I said. We could spoil any logo in a similar manner.

And as I said

I'm not saying the logo should absolutely avoid every possible negative symbol, but I'm pretty sure we can agree that there are a few images that we could watch out for. Given the Pyra's origin, a swastika is probably one of those.

And as I said:

We can play these childish games all day, or we can judge a logo on its merit, appeal, and design.

-God Ginrai

 

[WizardStan]

Except you're the only one playing childish games. After I specifically said we don't need to avoid every negative image you responded with a bunch of images which, while seemingly negative, have no actual relation to the product and ones I would not suggest they even consider avoiding. I'm only suggesting we might want to consider avoiding anything that looks vaguely swastika like because of where it is being manufactured.

Context is important. If an American company makes a sports drink called "Mist" I'd say "yeah, that sounds pretty good". If a German company makes a sports drink called "Mist", even if it was only to be marketed to the US, I'd ask what they were trying to pass off here.

 

[God Ginrai]

Except you're the only one playing childish games. After I specifically said we don't need to avoid every negative image you responded with a bunch of images which, while seemingly negative, have no actual relation to the product and ones I would not suggest they even consider avoiding. I'm only suggesting we might want to consider avoiding anything that looks vaguely swastika like because of where it is being manufactured.

Context is important. If an American company makes a sports drink called "Mist" I'd say "yeah, that sounds pretty good". If a German company makes a sports drink called "Mist", even if it was only to be marketed to the US, I'd ask what they were trying to pass off here.

Exactly. So if said German company makes a sports drink called "Malt", they wouldn't be arguing with each other that the world looks like "Mist"! There is no Swastika in this logo. You seem to be blithely ignoring this fact. That's why I said "If there was a Swastika" in my earlier post. And it's also the reason I suggested we stopped playing childish games, because you are arguing about a symbol that does not exist in the logo.

-God Ginrai

 

[Fzero]

weightwatchers ...

joker

 

[Granitehead]

Except you're the only one playing childish games. After I specifically said we don't need to avoid every negative image you responded with a bunch of images which, while seemingly negative, have no actual relation to the product and ones I would not suggest they even consider avoiding. I'm only suggesting we might want to consider avoiding anything that looks vaguely swastika like because of where it is being manufactured.

Context is important. If an American company makes a sports drink called "Mist" I'd say "yeah, that sounds pretty good". If a German company makes a sports drink called "Mist", even if it was only to be marketed to the US, I'd ask what they were trying to pass off here.

Exactly. So if said German company makes a sports drink called "Mast", they wouldn't be arguing with each other that the world looks like "Mist"! There is no Swastika in this logo. You seem to be blithely ignoring this fact. That's why I said "If there was a Swastika" in my earlier post. And it's also the reason I suggested we stopped playing childish games, because you are arguing about a symbol that does not exist in the logo.

-God Ginrai

With "Mast" there would be the problem of Mast again having a meaning in German, this time several, but one of those meanings is the substantive of "mästen" which means fatten an animal. (as this isn't a really constructive posts arguing any points I don't think I'm contradicting my earlier self saying I would stop wasting my time here )
Also I think everyone agrees there is no swastika in this logo, that's not the point.