Do we need a new logo?

I always liked the Frontier logo -- but I never thought of it from this point of view. Any graphic designers out there have ideas?

This email is anonymous.

I don't want to embarass the author.

He raises some very interesting and valuble points I thought...

Tue, Feb 11, 1997 at 2:13:07 PM by DW

G'day Dave,

Something has been bugging me about Frontier for about 2 years...

your LOGO !!!

Ughhh !!!

I am currently working for the Australian XXX Department (about 2000 macs) and it is *really* hard to be taken seriously with such a cartoon-ish looking logo appearing everywhere.

Every mac on our network has a copy of Frontier Runtime v3.0.3. The logo is in the main window !!

Create a droplet (we create many droplets) and what's the logo look like ... a cow's head skeleton !!! Create a deskscript (we create heaps of deskscripts) and the logo is a bloody cowboy !!! And don't even talk to me about MacBird's icon.

Last week was the final straw for me - I spend a lot of time and effort evangelising Frontier to people within our organisation. Last week I built a nifty deskscript which, with one double-click of the mouse, took the user straight into a filemaker database on our network. I demo'ed it to my (database development) colleagues - "great, fantastic, just what we want to give the users, give it to us for testing." "Sure" I say, "enjoy!". "Oh, one other thing" they say, "can you do this in Applescript ?" I frown. "Hmmm ... sure, I guess, applescript can certainly fire off the appropriate appleevents to filemaker." I'm puzzled but leave it at that. A couple of days later, I find out that they are beginning to distribute the script. Great, right ? Nope. They sent it out as an applescript !!! Took my code and rewrote it. "Why ?" I ask them, totally dumbfounded by their actions. "Well, you see, it's like this. Applescript is invisible. There's no message window. Applescript is faster because it's already running in the system. Frontier runtime takes an extra couple of seconds cause it has to launch first. Oh, and the desktop icon looks a bit silly." I shake my head. "But Frontier is multi-threaded ! Frontier has over 700 built-in verbs which don't require OSAXen. When we get around to building a version 4.x runtime (cause Userland aren't building it themselves :( ) it'll run 2-3 times faster than applescript cause it's ppc-native." They just shrug their shoulders. I sigh. The applescript continues to get distributed to the users.

Dave, I get this sort of response ALL THE TIME around the organisation. You need a *serious* corporate-type logo. It'll help me (and others no doubt) sell what is a *serious* product. I love Frontier. I have dedicated my career (I am a computer contractor) to Frontier and the Mac. I'm not stupid - I keep a close eye on the market. I have to, otherwise I may finish this current contract and find my skills are no longer required in general. I am banking on the Internet and Frontier for Windows to help me out. While I don't participate that much in the (great) Frontier community, I am busy building real-world, large-corporate solutions with Frontier. All those boring yet important things like automating backups, glueing applications together, managing workflow, and now building a mac-based website within our Intranet.

Anyway, just thought I'd blow off a bit of steam.

On a positive note, well, let's just say that if I didn't appreciate what great things you and Doug and the others are doing, I probably wouldn't feel strongly enough in the first place to write this letter.

Thanks,

Mr. X

P.S. Take a look at the logos listed on http://www.bzzzzzz.com/BeeHive/ADB_IO/ADBIO_Intro.html. Compare the Frontier one to the others. Most of them look professional.

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