I’m not sure about this one. A Lexington-based company has developed a new way of getting corporate logos all up in our face. By filling the sky with them. Snowmasters - better known for creating artificial snow - has developed a method of floating logos (and other simple icons) across the sky, opening up yet another way of advertisers to pump their brands to a largely captive audience. Basically anyone who’s outside.

Known as Flogos (combination of ‘flying’ and ‘logos’) the technique combines helium, oxygen (and some secret stuff) to produces a foamy substance that looks and floats very much like a cloud. Using stencils, the substance can be molded into almost any basic shape. And that means Flogos can be converted into objects such as Disney’s Mickey Mouse ears, the Atlanta Braves Tomahawk and the Peace Sign (pictured). More or less, whatever shape a company or organization wants, the company can develop a stencil for it. And that means company logos aplenty.

Depending on the foamy formula used, Flogos hover at heights of 300 to 500 feet, can travel for 20 to 30 miles before safely (and without any environmental impact) breaking up. According to inventors Francisco Guerra and Brian Glover, Flogos can bounce of buildings without breaking up (that is kinda cool) and can sometimes reach altitudes of 20,000 feet if weather conditions permit (pilots will just love that).

The equipment required to launch your own Flogos can be leased for about $2500 a day and the company is in development talks with some fairly large advertisers who’ve shown more than a passing interest. While the first release of the product is restricted to white only, there are plans for introducing various colors. Must admit, and despite whatever reservations I do have, this could be a huge hit for Snowmasters.

But I gotta ask - do we really need cloud spam cluttering up the summer sky? While it has a certain geek charm, and sure to amaze first time viewers, this is something that could get annoying real fast if the company’s as successful as they hope to be, looks like they might be, and a lot of companies jump on the wagon, pumping their flippin’ Flogos out wherever a crowd gathers. Some safety concerns too.

In an Time Daily feature on the product, a company described reactions to test Flogos floating out of the factory -

Motorists in the area literally have stopped and gotten out of their vehicles to take a closer look when they see a floating Flogo that the company is testing from its plant on (Hwy) Lauderdale 7

Great. Cars stopping in the middle of the highway to watch a sudsy advertisement float by. Not a good idea people. Not a good idea. Anyway, you can check out more about Flogos on their website flogos.net.

From the Sometimes You Can’t Catch a Break Dept. DataPortability WorkGroup is a new tech project aiming to allow users to control how their info is distributed through social networks. Released to otherwise positive reviews, the group encountered a major hurdle back in February - a cease and desist letter from Linux developers RedHat regarding the upstart’s logo. RedHat claimed that DataPortability’s infinity design (above left) bore more than a passing likeness to a RedHat trademark (above right), and suggested that the new company stop using it - or else. Typical legal stuff.

Rather than getting into a legal skirmish with the more established RedHat, DataPortability were advised by users and fans to just move on. “Do not spend 0.001% of your mindshare, time, or energy, worrying about a logo! Get a different logo” was one plea. TechCrunch, a popular tech blog, likewise suggested the battle wouldn’t be worth it and that the company simply “have a contest and let fans create a new logo for you”.

And so they did.

Well, that didn’t work out so well either. Selected on April 18, the digital ink wasn’t even dry on the winning contest entry (above left) when DataPortability received yet another cease & desist - this time from entertainment giant Vivendi claiming the second shot at the logo bore an unacceptable likeness to the graphic trademark for their French based file sharing service ZAOZA (above right). And just like the first time DataPortability are moving on to yet another logo attempt. As co-founder Chris Saad is quoted in the TechCrunch piece:

We’re going to speak with our lawyers, tweak it slightly and move on. These C&D tactics are really disappointing and counterproductive. We’d really rather everyone focused on the Technical Best Practice Drafts we released last week.

As much as I might be tempted to launch into another logo contest rant, I don’t think that’s the real issue here. What we can learn from this has more to do with the over-saturation of logos, trademarks and various graphic bits and pieces scattered all over the globe. The corporate landscape is becoming an increasingly cluttered marketplace with everyone and their brother trying to carve out their own brand niche. We can also conclude that the internet’s made it much easier to find supposedly infringing designs, so it’s generally not a good idea to copy anyone (relax - not claiming that happened here). And when it comes to designing a logo, probably worth your while to do a whole bunch of research into who’s already claimed what.

Cause there’s another important lesson here - trademark lawyers have a lot of time on their hands.

Speaking about sinister, over at Art Backwash, illustrative designer Von Glitschka takes a stab at designing a logo for Satan. Lots of branding potential. Established presence. Built-in market. Client brief mercifully short;

A) 666 has to be in the logo.
B) A brand name has to be developed. (Think Zoloft, Viagra or Crestor.)
C) Must use “Red”. (Satan owns this color. Sorry Target and Coke.)
D) No cliches. (Think devil horns and trident)

Price of failure? Well, there’s this whole soul deal…

Sure, you’ll find articles on the interwebs about the best logo. Maybe even the worst logo. But how about the most sinister logo? Only here at The Factor will you find that award, doled out to the Sherwin Williams Paint Company for their Cover the World design (left). Dripping (quite literally) with Spectre like imagery, it’s highly unlikely that such a concept would get off the ground today, let alone become the graphic representation of a major corporation. World domination isn’t exactly the type of theme that big wig companies like to be linked to (even if the plan is - bwahaha - knocked about during board meetings). That kind of stuff is best left to advertising apocalyptic sci-fi movies like War of The Worlds (right) to which the logo bears more than a passing resemblance. Designed by advertising manager George Ford in 1895, the Cover the World design replaced the original Sherman Williams idea - a paint-covered chameleon - and became the company’s trademark in 1905. You can read more about the company, and the genesis of the design at the American Heritage. And yes, the Earth in the logo has been knocked off its axis. Allows the can to pour paint directly onto Cleveland, Ohio - Sherwin Williams’ corporate HQ.

Lot of frothing going on in the design community, revolving around an alleged bit of scumbaggery - The Orphan Works Act - sitting in front of Congress. Summed up - an Orphan Work is to be considered any creative work of art where the artist or copyright owner has lost control of their copyright, by design, passage of adequate time (nothing new), or by lack of proper registration (very new) and when folks who want to use the work haven’t been able to track down the original copyright owner (very, very new). Under international law, copyright protection on a creative work is automatic, and this does seem to be at odds with standing conventions.

I had a skim read of the legal-heavy document and it would seem to suggest that under certain conditions, people can use someone else’s artwork, writing or music without permission. Or more importantly payment. Unless the work is registered with some yet-to-be-built database. Sounding rather draconian, Bill H.R. 5889, as the Orphan Works proposal is formally known, has stirred up a veritable hornet’s nest among creative types. Not surprising really. Award winning animator Mark Simon has a go - quoting such luminaries as Roger Dean (designer of the Yes logo and discussed in our best band logos feature). Dean has this to say about a similar effort across the pond -

This will devastate the livelihood of artists, photographers and designers in a number of ways. That at the behest of a few hugely rich corporations who got rich by selling art that they played no part in the making of, the U.S. and U.K. governments are changing the copyright laws to protect the infringer instead of the creator. This is unjust, culturally destructive and commercial lunacy. This will not just hurt millions of artists around the world.

Pretty heavy stuff. I’ve always been a huge fan of Dean, and I’d generally respect his opinion on anything to do with design. Admittedly I’m not too up on all this, so I’m going to root around the interwebs to see what’s what. I’ve found a load of resources for illustrators and designers that will take a month of Sundays to go through. Most designers, artists and illustrators seem to be falling squarely in the ‘nay’ camp. There’s people who are pro this bill - called themselves Save Orphan Works (the version in front of Congress is apparently a re-boot of an earlier attempt) who describe the new bill thusly;

Orphan works are — broadly speaking — any copyrighted works where the rights holder is hard to find. Because the cost of finding the owner is so high, creators can’t build on orphan works, even when they’d be willing to pay to use them. In many cases the works were abandoned because they no longer produced any income. In most cases, rights holders, once found, are delighted to have their work used.

Hmm. Not liking the sound of this ‘hard to find‘ routine. And because it’s too expensive to find the owner, copyright goes out the window? Not sure I’m hip with the ‘delighted to have their work used‘ deal either. There’s been many a time work from The Logo Factory, has been used without our permission. Delighted isn’t really the term I’d use to describe how we felt. Anyhoo, this Orphan Works plan certainly looks like it needs more investigation before I pull the fire-alarm.

Update: Hopping around a few links and found this. Plagiarism Today has a great form letter that designers opposed to Orphan Works can send their congresscritters. Also explains the rub to the bill in easy to understand language. And here’s a petition. There’s always a petition.

Australia’s Channel 9 news dude talks about the Apple iPhone on the tee vee. Why not, it’s a pretty cool toy. Trouble is, the iphone used in the piece is running Windows XP. Next up - Mac fanboy heads explode all over the outback.

Simultaneous hat tips to Photoshop Disasters and MacTalk Forum.