Oh dear...

well, uh, at least it's colorful... in many many ways.

PAM

Oh, Martin, that is dreadful. I heard on the news that there are people signing petitions to change it.

After much study, I see the 2012 represented in the logo. It is definitely unique and not what we might expect from London and the Olympics -- but can I say that I rather like it? It grew on me while I was trying to determine how it pertained to the Olympics.

It was obviously designed by a committee of Gestalt psychotherapists.
With the news that London had been awarded the 2012 Olympics being overshadowed the following day by the 7/7 bombings the country became distracted by the good news. It is only recently we have caught up with the rumblings about best use of land resources in the East End of London, the profiteers out to make a very quick buck, the inevitable ineptitude of the Govt departments, and the HUGE OVERSPEND that is happening before a single brick is laid.
But I'm sure when the time comes everyone will enjoy themselves.

LOL Martin, I see what you mean about the crude interpretation. Not that I have a dirty mind or anything :)

Wow. Someone once told me that if you can't say anything nice about someone, it's best to keep quiet.

I'm keeping quiet about the logo. But ..... wow.

I can't believe they actually unveiled something so atrocious. I'm sure they're trying to excite children into doing more sports, but the presentation looked like it came from 1986! I can't imagine that appealing to any children, or many adults for that matter.

As for the rude interpretation ... that's all I've seen since I first looked at it and can't see anything but!

I agree, it's hideous and in very poor taste....

I've got to agree, it's UGLY! Will there be a mascot to go with it (and can you imagine what that might look like!)?

(Vee ... "Gestalt psychotherapists" ... LOL!)

A good cartoon in today's paper
Go to the site below and click on Matt on the right.

btw If you check out the Alex cartoon you will see how Martin spends his days; I'm sure Alex is his double and they both work for a big American company. ;-)

Here is a link that might be useful: An Olympic Cartoon

Oh, my. What's worse is that the video enhances the crude interpretation.

An article in The Washington Post this morning said the cost for designing the logo was more that $800,000! Given than fact, I take back my statement that I rather like it. $800K should provide something more applicable and acceptable than this. I liked it as something someone might have scribbled on the back of a napkin at dinner one night.

Maybe my mind is just too squeaky clean (yeah, sure) but I don't see the crude interpretation.

By the time I got to the Alex site, the cartoon for 6/6 was posted. Boo hoo!

Good grief. Is that the best they could come up with?

Like Frances I can't figure out the crude interpretation. I've squinted at it from several angles, but all I can see is it's vaguely like a Nazi symbol...which I suppose is crude enough.

To see the cartoon, click on Matt and when the window opens, click on the "previous" button at the lower right corner. It worked for me just now.

I just read that it was supposed to look like graffiti (sp?). As one who is not fond of praising what amounts to defacing the property of others, I fail to find any redeeming qualities in this logo.

PAM

Wouldn't it be funny if we were all seeing different crude aspects of the logo? Our minds finding something because we have been told to look for it?

Chris - There may be other crude aspects of the logo, but I don't think so - judging by the people I've spoken to and the internet in general, I think there's one clear interpretation...!

frances, friedag - I'm not sure I want to be the one to sully your squeaky-clean minds, but let me just suggest to you that the right-hand side of the logo looks a bit like Lisa Simpson - and what CAN she be doing?

Vee - though I work for an equivalent of Megabank, my job is not, unfortunately, like Alex's - I don't deal with clients, which means I don't get to take them to Wimbledon, Test Cricket or the Cup Final. I'm also not paid anything like Alex...! But it's due to my hard work that their computer systems keep working.

Actually, I think Chris has a point. I can see a couple of rather rude interpretations.

. . . and Martin, you are such a decent chap I know you would never charge your mistress to your firm's expense account!

Some eg's of alternative logos below that cost the price of a sheet of paper and probably took 5 minutes to draw.

Here is a link that might be useful: Alternative logos

According to the Today show this morning, people are having seizures from viewing the logo. Somehow I don't think it will make it to 2012; it probably won't make it to Friday.

And, thanks to Martin, my mind is no longer squeaky clean and I also now can't view the logo in any other way. Maybe I can blame my squeakiness on the fact that I've never watched the Simpsons.

Oh, yikes! I think Chris is right, we might all be seeing different things ... what I saw in it initially was just mildly scatological and had nothing to do with Lisa Simpson doing ... umm ... but now that it's been pointed out ... yup, that's all I can see now.

I looked at the other logo suggestions on the Telegraph link yesterday, and the majority of them were SO much better. There was a really sleek one with the "o"s in LONDON linked into the Olympic rings that I liked a lot. This whole logo thing makes me think of Peter Mayle's Up the Agency, and I'm trying to imagine the state of mind of the marketing staff that came up with this.

Re the alternatives, I like numbers 2,4,5, and my favorite is no. 9. But any one of these are better, IMO, than the one chosen!

I wonder what's happened to the man/woman/team that has designed this mess. Do you think they still have jobs?

PAM

No way is my mind squeaky clean but I had to view repeatedly the logo till suddenly--bingo. I did wonder if the crude pic in my mind was the same as what others saw but after reading Martin's "hints," I'm seeing the common interpretation. (unlike picassocat's more imaginative mind) Gee, just what kind of Olympics are going on here?

What nonsense and poor judgment to pick a design which represents graffiti.

Well, the logo is now not only ugly and suggestive, it is apparently causing epileptic fits among its viewers. Do you suppose the designers have had to be sedated?

Here is a link that might be useful: Logo triggers epileptic fits

Last night on the way to my bookclub meeting, NPR did a piece on this logo. Not only were the epileptic fits and Lisa Simpson mentioned, some folks made reference to a "toileting monkey."

Very funny. Now Martin has pointed out the alternative viewing of the logo, it's hard to see anything else. :-)

The logo stinks. I like the readers' logos a lot more and for some of them it only took 10 mins. Amazing when you think about it - that it cost this much to make the awful logo and just a few mins to get something that would work just as well. My personal fav is the one which looks like the road signs in London, but I don't know if most people outside Brits would get it.

Where is Prince Charles when you need him? He would guide towards something less modern and ugly.

o.k. everyone have a good laugh....I still can't see Lisa Simpson doing ? but have to agree it's not what I would expect from lovely London. It's indeed awful, but now I'm bothered because I can't see anything
"off" within the picture. Do I have some kind of learning disability? If so, perhaps it's a good thing.

Pam, I didn't notice anything unsavoury about the logo and surely however awful the design nothing in bad-taste was intended, and I always think of Lisa Simpson as a bit of a priggish swot, over-compensating for her dysfunctional family, who will be forever 8 years old.
You just sit down by me and we'll polish out haloes together and think pure thoughts.

Pam and Vee, may I join you? Guess I've aged out.