Whatever happened to just saying, "It's pretty?"

This morning the logo for the London 2012 Olympic Games was unveiled, and it's a freaking mess. Well, maybe that's not fair. It's certainly original, though really difficult to remember. I've looked at it a few times this morning, and all I can say is that it's four shapes - no, five - that are asymmetrical, and after viewing them for a few minutes you might even make out that they create the numbers, "2012." And if you could make that out without having been told, you're a better man than I, Gunga Din. What I am really floored by is what Seth Godin also noticed in his blog: The creeping awfulness of the 2012 Olympic organizing committee's description of their new brand.

"This is the vision at the very heart of our brand," said London 2012 organizing committee chairman Seb Coe. "It will define the venues we build and the Games we hold and act as a reminder of our promise to use the Olympic spirit to inspire everyone and reach out to young people around the world. "It is an invitation to take part and be involved. "We will host a Games where everyone is invited to join in because they are inspired by the Games to either take part in the many sports, cultural, educational and community events leading up to 2012 or they will be inspired to achieve personal goals."

Err... if you really have that much to say about your new brand, your new brand isn't really saying that itself very effectively, is it? I mean sure, the Olympics are about inviting everyone to join in and take part - but your logo doesn't say anything of the sort. It just says, "London," has those killer Audi-like Olympic rings, and kind of, almost, sorta resembles the year, "2012." If you squint. The explanation they have given is the product of years of demanding that students be able to rationally defend their artistic decisions, many of which were originally based on taste and intuition. As such, you can't go to the world unveiling and say, "We thought this was really pretty," so you make up some marketing-speak and you put on a show. The idea is to preemptively make anyone feel stupid who would normally say, "I don't get it." Because now that person would instead say, "Holy cow - it says all that!?! What - really?" Olympic committee, just say you thought it was kind of pretty. Seeing as how this logo was decided upon through several months and several committees all pushing and pulling to get their own ideas into this thing, saying you picked it because you thought it was pretty still allows you to lie to us. You just won't sound as awkward doing it.

About the Author: Eric Reid

I am the Social Media Services Manager for Off Madison Ave. I've been with the company since 2006, when I was hired to do SEO, and link building in particular. When social networking sites started cropping up, at first I started using them to create backlinks - but they weren't the best for that, given all of the "nofollow" attributes. However, I did see the potential for all of the direct referral traffic they represent. Since then I've been actively pursuing both tactics for clients: Links that can help them for search, and social postings that get them involved in the conversation. It's about the coolest job you could ever get. ;)

View more blog posts from Eric Reid >

Contact Eric

<< back to blog