Posts Tagged Comic
Less than related to graphic design today, taking a bit of a risk I know. I have shoveled my driveway twice in two days, today I will do so again. This duty falls to me not just because I AM MAN, which I like think, at least around here and despite the frequent challenges to superiority I endure from my dog, but also because I am a work-from-home professional. Simply put, I am here, thus I must clear the way for those in this family who must not be here.
And when I say that I am shoveling my driveway, know that I am shoveling the ice planet of Hoth away from these paths. And that once this task is complete, the snow itself laughs like a decadent Viking King, gorged on a hearty meal, and simply waves away all traces of my hard work with a smile. It’s as though you can look out the front window of my house and see no clue or hint that I had ever had any impact upon that icy landscape. And yet, forward I will go, to work my appointed task, for I must.
Occasionally I will see my neighbors, with their fancy snowblowers, but my eyes do not look upon them with jealously. Somewhere in my upbringing, and I am not sure where, really, I equated shoveling a driveway with your bare hands with life accomplishment. It is a hard, tiring task, worth much effort, and in the end you can look out upon your work (for a minute or two at least) over the brim of a mug of hot chocolate and feel something close to pride. Using a snowblower feels a bit more like mowing the lawn, which is a chore, and not something to be celebrated. Perhaps I need to buy a hand-powered lawnmower. Time will tell.
There was much more of a visceral reaction to Friday’s Craigslist comic than I anticipated. Apparently that’s something an awful lot of us have had to deal with in our time. While the conversation over there has a few good tales, I’d be remiss not to have to you spend a few hours of your day wasting away in front of the megasite for airing such grievances.
I’d also be remiss not to mention our fun-timey interview/chat with designer/author Jason Tselentis, who a little birdie told me may have found himself in a contest to out-foxy one Steven Gordon. How this contest ended I do not know. That we are still here upon this Earth following it means it did not go full-force, and precludes a rematch may someday occur.
And, lastly, my reward for finishing today’s strip was waiting until I was done to watch this (office warning — naughty words present):
Can I confess? Someone I know has made one of those logos. Okay, okay, it might be a bit of a stretch. It probably is. the curse of knowing has plagued me for some time now. Do you say something? Do you not? It’s like having bad news for a friend, and it’s not really your place to tell them, but you don’t want some a-hole to do it and make it worse?
You know what the best part of this is? Now all of my friends are looking at their old logos to figure out if it’s them. Yes. It is you.
By the way, accidentalsexlogos.com is available, if that’s your thing.
The staggering failures of the AOL identity project released last week continue to amaze me. Covered thoughtfully here, you can really take the time to savor the flavor of deceit and corporate ineptitude. I’m not really talking about AOL when I say that, either. No, it’s the paragon of bad design, Wolff Olins, who is again the culprit.
After the London Olympic logo fiasco, and to a lesser extent Wacom’s “thing,” one might begin to wonder how these people stay in business. I believe that their client list, for one, has so many giant names of industry listed on it that it blinds potential clients to the thievery they are about to experience. Second, it is entirely possible in this day and age, still, for a client to hire an agency without doing a proper Google search. But lastly, and what I believe to be the true representation of their power, they must have a highly motivated sales/account management staff who can sell shit like this with a straight face.
Either way, work like the AOL “identity” and the others, when coupled with the sneering, look-at-how-clever-we-are press releases and after-the-fact justifications make all designers look bad. I’d like to ask them to stop.