Symbian Foundation: day one and a new logo

[Rafe]

Yesterday marked 'day one' of the Symbain Foundation. The Symbian Foundation announced the commencement of the beta testing of its new website and that 81 companies have applied for membership (50 of which are first time endorsers). The new logo of the Symbian Foundation was alo unveiled: Symbian, in stylised letters, underlain by a yellow heart. Read on for more.

Read on in the full article.

So what's the new website like? What can you tell us about it?

[Tzer2]

Associating rubber ducks with Symbian devices... now where did they get that idea from? ;-)

[Rafe]

We're not part of the beta test so we can't tell you! However there is some extra info in the press release. I imagine it will be out of beta fairly quickly and we'll take a look then and report back.

[hargs48]

gotta be honest here,I am not liking this "non-retro" logo...

[Sergey Zak]

Was that a cheapskate logo design?
Honestly, I'm sure yellow heart has lots of ramifications on your health.
BTW if going so radical, why not abandon this "parasite-sounding" name altogether?
(You know, some people still "dunno" the spelling... simbiant, symbion)
Just compare this to "WebOS".

[zyler]

Looks like the kind of thing I might have come up the first time I used CorelDraw.

[davekolmer]

Yikes. The new logo looks like it was designed by a 4-year old. I think it looks simply awful...childish, uninspiring, amateurish. And I agree...the name Symbian has almost no recognition or traction here in the U.S. Not sure why.

[sandy_1988]

The logo looks pathetic at its best. I hope they bring back the old logo or design a better logo before the platform reaches the masses.

[Tzer2]

AFAIK this logo isn't intended for end users, it's meant for developers who are interested in open source software. That's probably why there's a "fanzine" style about it rather than anything corporate, because they're trying to emphasise that Symbian is leaving its corporate-oriented roots.

The end users will (probably) continue to only see manufacturers' brands and logos on Symbian devices, so the Symbian Foundation logo is completely irrelevant to them because they'll never see it.

the name Symbian has almost no recognition or traction here in the U.S. Not sure why.

The reason is because Symbian devices haven't sold well in America, despite selling well practically everywhere else in the world (including Japan).

There are various explanations for this, but perhaps the most interesting theory is that Americans seem to prefer more PDA-like smartphones, whereas the rest of the world seems to prefer more phone-like smartphones.

In favour of this theory is that Apple's iPhone is basically the same proportions as a traditional Palm-like device (to make it more computer-like), whereas the latest crop of upcoming Symbian devices use a narrower and longer screen which puts them closer to the shape of a traditional mobile phone (perhaps to make them easier to operate with one hand just like normal phones).

[neilhoskins]

Originally Posted by Tzer2

The reason is because Symbian devices haven't sold well in America, despite selling well practically everywhere else in the world (including Japan).

There are various explanations for this.

Mmmm.... you didn't mention the possible, slight branding problem. Have you ever tried googling for "Sybian"?

[Raven]

Originally Posted by neilhoskins

Mmmm.... you didn't mention the possible, slight branding problem. Have you ever tried googling for "Sybian"?

Hehe, yeah I was just about to mention that word.

It's not only in NA though, Symbian OS isn't exactly well known in the rest of the world either. Certainly not to the end users. Most people (practically everyone) buying a Symbian phone has no idea about the underlying OS, the UI, nor that they have just got themselves a brand new pocket sized 'multimedia computer'.

Btw, hate the new logo.

Hated the new logo at first when I saw it here. Then followed the link to the Symbian Foundation blog and at a much reduced size with all the nice hand-drawn elements next to it, it looks pretty good, echoing the thoughts of one of the commenters there:

I find that when people see how all the different elements of the branding cartoons and doodles fit together - in the animations and other creative designs - then they lose any initial scepticism they had about the brand design.

Big it looks horrible, but as a dinky logo - no complaints. Have a look at some other corporate logos scaled up to be as big as the logo on this page - many look pretty awful as well! (OK,OK, not the apple one, I said 'many' :P )

[langdona]

I like the logo it looks simple fresh and modern to me.
It also seems a bit light hearted which I think is a nice twist for and OS company who are normally seen as very serious.

[davidmaxwaterma]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Hated the new logo at first when I saw it here. Then followed the link to the Symbian Foundation blog and at a much reduced size with all the nice hand-drawn elements next to it, it looks pretty good, echoing the thoughts of one of the commenters there:



Big it looks horrible, but as a dinky logo - no complaints. Have a look at some other corporate logos scaled up to be as big as the logo on this page - many look pretty awful as well! (OK,OK, not the apple one, I said 'many' :P )

I agree with this. I hated it when I saw it on AAS, but on Share on Ovi there are some other images that kind of put it in some context; then my attitude changed considerably.

Perhaps AAS should put one of the other images up here, since this bare image is misleading - I doubt it's designed to be used on it's own like this.