Logo Theft – Copy, Alter and Replicate…Shamefully Though!
POSTED: September 20th, 2007

A logo is a visual character that solely represents a particular firm, entity, institution or brand, defining its nature and identity. However, since the evolution of logo as the ‘identity mark’ over the years, plenty of iconic designs have been stolen and reused illegally. At times, logo theft is troubling and sickening, as people have no regard for the original logo designs. By committing a logo theft and making it work for their own use, they violate the copyrights of the firm as well as the rights of their clientèle. Today, many firms are committing logo theft, just by altering the genuine logo. Thus the visual art appears to be too similar.

This unfortunate practice of logo theft has not been a recent trend; in fact logo theft has been taking place for quite some time now. Lately, the logo theft trouble bubbled up between Quark, a leading design software program manufacturer, and the Scottish Arts Council.

Quark’s new logo bears a striking resemblance to the logo of the Scottish Arts Council. It is the worst type of logo theft; however quark fortunately rectified its mistake and has adopted a new identity mark.

Another example of logo theft includes, Applied Materials and Planned Parenthood having nearly similar logos.

The difference here is merely three lines against two, a mirror image and the layering of the lines. The lines in Applied Materials logo acquire 3-D layering where as the Planned Parenthood logo has a 2-D layering. Obviously, the resemblance here is no coincidence. This sort of logo theft is immoral and palpably illegal.

An additional instance for logo theft is Sun Microsystems vs. Columbia Sportswear. The clear dissimilarity here is that the U shapes are filled up in the Columbia logo. From a distance or even at low resolution, both look alike.

The designer of the Sun Microsystems logo must have come across many logos in his/her life. However when asked to design something for a client, s/he has created an identity mark which is certainly not considered original.

Looking at the logos for Laszlo and Etelos, it is obvious even to an untrained eye that ogo theft has been done here as well. The shading of the logo for Laszlo has been changed and the elements within the Laszlo logo are slightly different, but nevertheless both identity marks look alike and hence it is certain that logo theft has taken place.

It is almost never the error of the firm itself that it is displaying a copied logo. The fault lies at the graphic designer’s end, who intentionally or unintentionally commits logo theft. Logo thefts should be stopped, and designers should strive to come up with their own alluring ideas to create new, intelligent and original logos. Logo theft is an act of copyright violation and a disrespect of another designer’s hard work, ideas and creativity.

Note: Read the sequel to this article here – Logo Theft Part 2 – Copy, Alter, Replicate…Intelligently though!

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14 users responded in " Logo Theft – Copy, Alter and Replicate…Shamefully Though! "

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vorg said, in September 20th, 2007 at 5:40 am

Compare this two
http://www.unilever.com/
http://www.swiat-zdrowia.pl/
People call this ‘inspiration’ but I don’t!

rachel said, in September 20th, 2007 at 6:53 am

Just trying to play devil’s advocate here… But I find it EXTREMELY difficult to come up with completely unique and original logos that look nothing like any one else’s. With the advent of logo sites like “LogoYes” and designers who put every logo they’ve ever created up on the web (http://www.misipile.com/) — you can see similarities all over the place… just like in music when a song sounds like another song. On Misipile’s own site there are logos that look oddly similar…

I’m not saying that this is right and that copying should be excused, I just think that there are SO MANY logos and visual identities out there, it can be tricky to find something that is 100% unique. I guess… a little bit of mercy should be granted. Well except on that Scottish Arts & Quark one - what a TOTAL rip off! And that Britney Spears ibelieve one you posted about a few weeks back.

Maybe I’m just copping out…..

Des Kolke said, in September 20th, 2007 at 7:05 am

Jessica,

With all due respect. Etelos has been around since 1999. The Present logo has been in use since 2002. I believe Laszlo Systems began in 2002 and I do not have any information as to when they created their “mark” but I would believe that it was some time after that.

The point I’m making is that though logo theft is a problem. One must be careful about pointing fingers. I believe the similarities between Etelos and Laszlo is a coincidence and nothing more.

Joana said, in September 20th, 2007 at 12:38 pm

If you hadn´t said sun imitated columbia, I would guess the opposite.

I think columbia logo is a simple pattern called here “dama”.
And sun logo I loved because of the name “sun” we can read repeteadly and the feel of disorder it brings, although keeping this traditional pattern.

But I agree with you, if they had a better idea (as I think they did! Maybe they´ve copied it too…), there should be a new way to explore it, not using the columbia general properties.

Father Dom said, in September 21st, 2007 at 3:22 am

I think you need to re-examine what design is. Design exists as derivatives “of”. There is no design which is completely unique, since we humans base our understanding based on shared experiences- ways of perceiving “something”, meaning that the “something” already exists. There are cases where designers just plain’ol copy and that is wrong. Besides the first example, which “could” have been copied, the other two are not. But maybe you as a designer would like to hire I trademark lawyer to actually prove your article valid. I find it quite funny that you are talking about logo theft when this is exactly what you are doing! You don’t have the right top post these logos on your site!!!!!!!

Russ said, in September 21st, 2007 at 8:12 am

I can see some major similarities in some of the logos mentioned. But I think you are drawing a long bow on the rest.

Sure they have similar attributes, but theft is a pretty damaging term t apply to many of your examples.

Best be careful how far you push that opinion.

geez said, in September 22nd, 2007 at 8:31 pm

You’re going too far saying logo THEFT, pointing fingers directly to those people. The first case has such a stupidly simple design that it’s almost impossible not to find something like that being used somewhere else. Actually, all your examples have fairly simple lines that are so easy to remember, yet so easy to be copied unintentionally. I’ve seen many examples of identical logos from opposite companies in different countries that are not “thefts” for sure. When you create a logo you must make it unique, simple, and that is meant to be remembered. if you make it a circle inside a square, it surely won’t be unique.
Sometimes people go way too far because of these things.. geez

Blake said, in September 23rd, 2007 at 1:39 pm

I think that some of these examples of “theft” are unintentional. Visual ideas are always going to have a lot of overlap, not only because logos are reduced to the simplest possible version of a concept or feel, but because designers very closely follow trends, and limit the pool of likely ideas even more.

Look at the field of “web 2.0 style” sites with their mirrored text-based logos and teardrop shaped icons. You could find hundreds of examples of “theft” that are probably better described as designers with similar backgrounds working within a relatively narrow visual style.

Giuliano said, in September 28th, 2007 at 1:27 am

Scotish - Quark = YES (100%)
Sun - Columbia = YES (80%), obviously inspiration is from Sun logo
Lazlo - Etelos = NO (There is 100+ Web 2.0 logos with similar detail)
Planned - Applied = ABSOLUTELY NO (I really can’t take you as a experienced designer if you think that this is stolen logo???)

Matt said, in September 28th, 2007 at 7:03 am

i agree with these comments. I think you’re stretching pretty far on the planned parenthood/applied materials one, and the laslo/etelos logos use a very common symbol found in logo design. MANY logos use that same little barbell looking symbol… i hardly think that they are stealing the logo from someone just by using common design elements. also the sun logo issue can be seen repeated in hundreds of logos (i would imagine) all over the world. that pattern is certainly not unique in any way and similar patterns can be seen in clothes, architectural structures, old symbols, jewelry etc. i mean… using this argument you can say that all these logos are stealing from ancient artists.
Anyway… i think you make a valid point that a lot of designers don’t try to create logos that are unique enough. I do however think that there are only so many different ideas we can have. Where does the line get drawn though is the real question. Certainly we can’t expect people not to take inspiration from other’s ideas. but on the other hand we should expect that they will use the inspiration to aid them in creating unique things instead of copying someone else’s work.

Casey said, in October 12th, 2007 at 8:26 pm

Some of these examples are most likely coincidental and not theft.

Steven Stiles said, in November 3rd, 2007 at 8:22 pm

Has anyone else noticed the CMA Country Music Awards logo has a suspicious similarity to Star Trek’s starfleet arrowhead insignia? Really the two are virtually indistinguishable. Country music and SciFi, now why didn’t anyone think of that sooner. C’mon Joe saddle up the starship and let’s rustle us up some Klingons.

Dan Lewis said, in January 8th, 2008 at 2:41 am

Just to clarify regarding the Laszlo logo. We also began in 1999 and the logo was done in early 2000. It was a challenge to come up with a solution for a number of reasons. First, it’s not the best name in the world, our product was difficult to convey easily and the “L” is not the best letterform in the world. We went through quite a few ideas for logos and this one was inspired but some simple graphical elements that we played with which were then refined and simplified.

Prior to coming across this blog I had never heard of Etelos or seen their logo, which it seems came out later. Assuming our logo was completed first, am I upset about Etelos’ logo? Not in the least. They share a common graphical element. That’s it. Nearly impossible to create a logo now that doesn’t in some small way look like someone else’s, either in form or color.

As a designer you only have a certain amount of influence anyways. Generally you create concepts and then present them, take feedback and work towards a final design. There are often lots of external forces driving you down solution paths you might not always choose.

Benjamin said, in June 25th, 2008 at 12:43 pm

I think that often not always but often when a logo is being made the people asking for it will have a certain set list of criteria they want to come across in the logo. Seeing as their are so many projects trying to operate under the same rhetoric of simplicity and sleek’ness their are bound to be duplicates. Also I think in the case of alot of the rounded logos its down to the ease of that method of working in illustrator or whatever vector program is at hand.

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Logo Theft – Copy, Alter and Replicate…Shamefully Though! POSTED: September 20th, 2007

14 users responded in " Logo Theft – Copy, Alter and Replicate…Shamefully Though! "

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Logo Theft – Copy, Alter and Replicate…Shamefully Though!
POSTED: September 20th, 2007