Discuss the Discord rebrand

[⇛Marnetmar⇛]

 

"Imagine a Place... where you can belong to a school club, a gaming group, or a worldwide art community. Where just you and handful of friends can spend time together. A place that makes it easy to talk every day and hang out more often."

 

I think a good jumping-off point for this discussion would be this Solar Sands video:

 

 

Edited May 19, 2021 by Marn

[BaileyTW]

Well you can't really do much worse than "gamer skype".

[[McD] James]

[continuum.mid]

Only thing that bothers me is the display font, the old font looked better.

 

What Discord should do is set up an open API so I can use a different client than the mediocre web/Electron one. Then UI changes need not affect anyone.

[IncognitoMode]

reject discord return to irc

[snapshot]

 

still works just as well as it did before so I don't mind.

[Hawk of The Crystals]

Oh well, at least some people have ventrilo.

[Biodegradable]

I think the biggest thing I've noticed over the past say... 10-15 years or so, minimalism has become the dominant art movement when it comes to things like logos and architecture. Everything has become extremely streamlined and dull with a lack of detail. While I have nothing against minimalist design overall, it's been a fairly obvious trend that refuses to die. Discord's logo redesign is just a symptom of this minimalist approach that nobody seems to be railing against and conforming to it more and more over the years. Logos for different programs, software and internet browsers are the best example of this thing making stuff look more and more dull over time:

 

  

 

 

It's like some kind of disease that's turning everything uniform and boring. 

Edited May 20, 2021 by Biodegradable

[⇛Marnetmar⇛]

I happen to quite like minimalist art.

 

I'm more curious about the chain of logic and decisions that results in corporate art and messaging being "safe" in its signature way.

 

Obviously, if you're a big corporation, you're going to want to be relatively bland in your messaging so as to alienate as few people as possible. But who exactly is the demographic being driven away simply by a company having an art style that's easily identifiable as its own, and how do you determine they're being driven away? Do consumers actually exist who will decide they don't want anything to do with a company if their otherwise unremarkable and inoffensive font still doesn't have as much rounded edges as it could? And where are they?

Edited May 20, 2021 by Marn

[lokbustam257]

1 hour ago, Biodegradable said:

I think the biggest thing I've noticed over the past say... 10-15 years or so, minimalism has become the dominant art movement when it comes to things like logos and architecture. Everything has become extremely streamlined and dull with a lack of detail. While I have nothing against minimalist design overall, it's been a fairly obvious trend that refuses to die. Discord's logo redesign is just a symptom of this minimalist approach that nobody seems to be railing against and conforming to it more and more over the years. Logos for different programs, software and internet browsers are the best example of this thing making stuff look more and more dull over time:

 

  

 

 

It's like some kind of disease that's turning everything uniform and boring. 

i missed the old chrome logo

[Biodegradable]

9 minutes ago, lokbustam257 said:

i missed the old chrome logo

 

I know, right? Looks SO much fucking better.

[ReaperAA]

I am definitely not a fan of the new Discord font. It looks boring and generic AF. The old font was much better. It reminds me of the time when Pepsi changed it's font back in 2008-2009.

 

And speaking about the minimalistic logos, I can understand why some folks like them, but I am personally not a fan of ultra-modern-minimalism. I think there should be balance between not having a logo be too over-detailed but also not making it too bland/boring. 

 

Consider the firefox logos. The 2009 logo looks dated because it is a bit too detailed. But on the flip side, the 2017 and 2019 logos look bland and boring. The 2013 logo had a good balance in my opinion. Not to mention that the 2013 logo actually looks more aesthetically pleasing to me than the 2017/2019 logos because it doesn't have super bright colors.

 

The same goes for Chrome. The 2008 logo is overdetailed, but the modern logo is too bland. The logo they had in the early-2010s was a bit better (although that one was a bit too minimalistic as well).

Edited May 20, 2021 by ReaperAA

[Doomkid]

I love the Uber-detailed icons and logos, they bring me back to that XP era when everyone wanted to show off how cool it was not being limited to 16/256 colors. Now everyone is like “3 distinct colors? Let’s not go too crazy now, bland gruel is the name of the game!”

 

Discord is so new that it’s always been minimalistic since that trend was already in vogue by the time it was made, but I have to say the new font looks really goofy and almost childish, like a logo you’d see on a Fisher Price product. Some metrics out there must show that this has the broadest appeal but it looks goofy to me personally.

[Sergeant_Mark_IV]

I don't care about Discord's logo change because it was already born on the current generation of art and the OG logo was already very minimalistic, I literally didn't even notice it.

The then/now comparison chart is really depressing, things turning bland and soulless to appeal to a bland and soulless generation, but fortunately, like all things, artistic trends are temporary.
Things are reaching peak minimalism, at some point an artistic rebellion will have to happen. Remember when were getting tired of Bauhaus architecture, then we got Brutalism to literally make a statement against it.

[NoXion]

Good video in the OP. I too am dismayed with the current minimalist trend in commercial design, which feels like it tries so hard to be bland and inoffensive, that it ends up becoming appalling, especially given how ubiquitous it's become. I prefer the more hard-edged look of the old Discord font. Personally, I can't wait for this minimalism trend to die. Maybe the next trend could be inspired more by Gothic and Rococo architecture? A man can dream.

[snapshot]

This reminds me of the time when everyone was getting sick of brown military shooters then Mirror's Edge came out with its minimalistic art style and

u n i q u e gameplay style, lets see if everyone will get sick of minimalistic designs and u n i q u e gameplay styles so we can go back to brown military shooters once again, an endless cycle!

[NoXion]

6 minutes ago, sluggard said:

This reminds me of the time when everyone was getting sick of brown military shooters then Mirror's Edge came out with its minimalistic art style and

u n i q u e gameplay style, lets see if everyone will get sick of minimalistic art style and u n i q u e gameplay styles so we can go back to brown military shooters once again, an endless cycle.

I don't doubt that gritty aesthetics using dull colours will make a comeback, but it won't be exactly as it was before. I think this kind of thing is not so much a cycle that turns back on itself, but more like a helix, an oscillating pattern that circles around without looping back on itself. History rhyming, rather than repeating itself. After all, when Neoclassicist architecture was in vogue, it was far from an entirely faithful recreation of the ancient Roman and Greek architecture that inspired it.

[ReaperAA]

11 minutes ago, sluggard said:

This reminds me of the time when everyone was getting sick of brown military shooters then Mirror's Edge came out with its minimalistic art style and

u n i q u e gameplay style, lets see if everyone will get sick of minimalistic designs and u n i q u e gameplay styles so we can go back to brown military shooters once again, an endless cycle!

 

I, for one, am actually glad that we have finally moved past the brown military shooter era and I hope it doesn't come back again.

[holaareola]

Ah, the firefox 04 logo is so good!

 

I actually think flat and minimal is best for everyday UI. I hated the old skeuomorphic design epitomised by yesteryear Apple. It's more visually interesting, but it's also so noisy. For things that are facilitating everyday life (as phone OSs and many apps now do) I think form and function should be very closely bound. It's unfortunate that this has seeped out to so many other areas though. It probably says something about how awash in the virtual everyone is that a style which works excellently for digital interfaces even manifests outside the screen on paper and in metal and concrete. 

 

@NoXion Rococo, hah. Love that word. I wish, but elaborate styles like those require pushing financial efficiency downward, while minimalism offers a bigger bottom line. It's a good style for capitalism and expressive of where societal values are. Not to say that you can't do minimalist and beautiful at the same time, but in England at least, the amount of crimes against architecture going up every year shows that if you've got the money, they'll let you build. Beauty? What's that worth exactly?!

[NoXion]

2 minutes ago, holaareola said:

@NoXion Rococo, hah. Love that word. I wish, but elaborate styles like those require pushing financial efficiency downward, while minimalism offers a bigger bottom line. It's a good style for capitalism and expressive of where societal values are. Not to say that you can't do minimalist and beautiful at the same time, but in England at least, the amount of crimes against architecture going up every year shows that if you've got the money, they'll let you build. Beauty? What's that worth exactly?! 

I think modern minimalism in architecture can work well, angular designs like the Shard look pretty good to me. But I'm not a fan of the more curvy, blobby style that makes buildings look like jelly moulds. Stuff like the Gherkin and the Walkie-Talkie building in London. It looks so gash!

Although my main complaint with the new builds in my area has less to do with their aesthetics, and more to do with how they look like they won't last more than two decades. All that fucking awful composite panelling, instead of proper building materials like brick, glass and concrete.

[roadworx]

the font looks awful, but other than that...meh. some people are waaay overreacting about it.

 

i will, however, agree with everyone saying that the trend of minimalism sucks. it looks shitty, bland, and honestly has ruined any sort of minimalist art because i can't help but associate it with soulless corporations

[Gez]

It's not just minimalism; it's the garish colors and exaggerated postures that are meant to artificially convey some visual interest to utterly shallow pictures. It's the graphical equivalent of elevator muzak.

[[McD] James]

I know this is getting off-topic a bit, but I've always disliked the most recent Pepsi logo and have never gotten used to it. I wish they'd stuck with the logo introduced in 1998. That logo was great.

[roadworx]

7 minutes ago, [McD]James said:

I know this is getting off-topic a bit, but I've always disliked the most recent Pepsi logo and have never gotten used to it. I wish they'd stuck with the logo introduced in 1998. That logo was great.

apparently pepsi paid a million dollars to have the new logo designed

 

doomworld's logo looks better than it and i doubt ling paid a million freakin' dollars for it

[vyruss]

I have yet for a logo change of any kind to any brand do any form of severe physical, logical, or other type of damage to any aspect of my life or to that of anyone I know.

[Doomkid]

9 minutes ago, vyruss said:

I have yet for a logo change of any kind to any brand do any form of severe physical, logical, or other type of damage to any aspect of my life or to that of anyone I know.

ugly minimalist logos kicked my dog!!!!!!

[leejacksonaudio]

Meh.

[HavoX]

14 hours ago, [McD]James said:

^ This.

[ReaperAA]

1 hour ago, [McD]James said:

I know this is getting off-topic a bit, but I've always disliked the most recent Pepsi logo and have never gotten used to it. I wish they'd stuck with the logo introduced in 1998. That logo was great.

 

Agreed. The Pepsi Logo/font from 1998-2007 was the best.

[Final Verdict]

I have to agree with others. I'm not a fan of the modern trend of minimalistic logos, design and art. I have to admit it's hard not to feel insulted by it. Like we're too dim-witted to appreciate anything more complex or grand.

 

I'm exaggerating a little, but that's the feeling I get sometimes. It's something I can't shake off every time I see it. That's on top of it looking uninspired and bland. I'm only talking about the modern trend with logos, design and art. I'm fine with minimalism in general.