Real talk: I don’t like Medium’s new logo.
Medium just changed its logo from white serif M on a black background not unlike the serif font that the site “brought back” from the dead and proved usable for an online writing site in a sans-serif dominated internet.
The online publishing medium moved on towards a more geometric, sans-serif M.
“We began to see the four planes of the logo as overlapping strains of a conversation. A conversation whose tone and direction shift as the planes come into contact with each other.”
In their Medium post, designers Erich Nagler and Karen Jaimes explained the rationale behind the change of branding. They stated that while the old logo was simple, elegant, and strong, it proved rather inflexible.
“It served us well through our first few of years, but as Medium has grown and evolved, the logo has begun to feel flat, impenetrable, blunt, and not to be toyed with. It is also not particularly distinctive, either. In short, our M no longer captured or conveyed what Medium has become.”
They spent the past summer brainstorming to create a better logo that is a better representation of the current Medium. For designers and enthusiasts, the logo making process of Medium is remarkable.
Defining your identity as a brand is the most crucial step in rebranding your logo, something that Medium logo designers spent a considerable amount on. They started having fun incorporating the letter M to embody what Medium is.
“We pursued the concept that our logo could be made of a series of interconnected ideas or shapes that, when joined together, form a new thought. A logo that flows, unfurls, and builds like a great and memorable conversation.”
But honestly, it kinda went downhill from there.
“We began to see the four planes of the logo as overlapping strains of a conversation. A conversation whose tone and direction shift as the planes come into contact with each other.”
Seems kind of a stretch. I doubt that someone would immediately assume that the four planes of Medium’s new logo represent “overlapping strains of conversation.”
You can’t force meaning to geometric shapes. Even the color reminds me of Kickstarter’s logo. The sketching phase was awesome but it’s sad that Medium chose to go the generic geometric look for its rebranding.
In addition, by looking at the favicon of the site in my browser, I could see that it doesn’t scale well. It looks like a weird N.
Medium, for me, was the definitive publishing tool in terms of site design, readability, and its awesome community. When Facebook recently overhauled their Facebook Notes, my first comment was “It looks like Medium.” They have created the measuring stick for having a readable and aesthetically-pleasing avenue for communication.
And they have abandoned that with their recent rebranding.
I don’t know. It might grow on me in time. But for now, it sucks.
Do you agree with my assessment? Comment below!