Greater than X - obvious, lazy, inevitable, or other?

[Ensign Steve]

Because I am a human, I am great at pattern recognition, and the thing that has been making me crazy lately is this stupid stylized X with a greater-than sign overlaid on the first half of it.

I first noticed that this men's clothing store near my house had the same X as the new Verizon XLTE logo:



but I couldn't find the store online (and have since forgotten the other letters, I think it's D-something-X), so I let it go because honestly who cares.

But then I installed the Plex Media Server app on my Roku, and that was the final straw:


I'm no graphic artist, and in fact I have nothing but mad respect for people who do it. I know that the shit I am good at is not magic, it's actually rooted in some extremely deterministic stuff, but designers are able to tap into some kind of extradimensional something that I have zero access to. I know that, and it consistently blows my mind and makes me wicked envious. But still when I see shit like this, I can't help but wonder if everybody is just copying each other or it's the obvious thing to do or what. Or am I just that prone to pattern recognition?

[Ensign Steve]

Maybe I should have put this in the Art forum.

[BrotherMan]

But still when I see shit like this, I can't help but wonder if everybody is just copying each other or it's the obvious thing to do or what. Or am I just that prone to pattern recognition?

Yes.

[lisarea]

Whoa.

I just did an image search on "X logo" and damn. You're right.

There is a LOT of copying in graphic art, so I'd suspect some of that, maybe also some of Xes being cool and the limited potential for stuff to do with them so people will definitely notice that there's a greater than symbol in them (or a command prompt lol they're command prompts you should know that).

[Janet]

I don't think it's supposed to be a greater-than symbol. I think it's supposed to be the play icon on a video or music. I know those are usually filled in, still it feels like that's the meaning they are trying to imply.

[Zehava]

Originally Posted by BrotherMan

Yes.

Definitely a lot of copying. How many iWhatever products hit the market after the sucess of the iPhone?

[Ensign Steve]

My command prompt is a dollar sign.

[lisarea]

commandline.png

I meant for OTHER, WORSE PEOPLE.

[lisarea]

Oh, wait.

I think some cat probably came around and posted the wrong command prompt even though I was specifically talking about this one.

commandline.png

[BrotherMan]

X is a curious letter of our alphabet. It is symmetrical on two axes (maybe four if you're feeling frisky). Culturally, from algebra it's commonly used to mean ANYTHING and maybe even EVERYTHING (and sometimes NOTHING all at the same time!). It can be small (xs) it can be large (XL!). It can be mysterious (X-Files). It can mean something amazing - X-TREME! So, graphically, it can be used as a short hand to create impact and imply meaning and importance.

In the eXamples you provided, one could suggest that making the X appear like it do implies forward moving or thinking, progressive, innovative. It's all touchy-feely, buzzwordy stuff and the deep down truth to it is that artists create it like that because it looks cool.

[Crumb]

I wonder if anyone has used the less than sign for an X.

[BrotherMan]

Index On Censorship uses an X logo with the dominant cross pointing to the left.

Slightly more common is having an X with arrows pointing both directions, like this X.org logo.

[Hermit]

Originally Posted by Ensign Steve

I can't help but wonder if everybody is just copying each other or it's the obvious thing to do or what. Or am I just that prone to pattern recognition?

Both, I think, but mostly it becomes fashionable for a while. Commercial artists sell their products, and buyers take a liking for a particular style just like consumers at one stage thought bell-bottoms and garishly patterned body-shirts with oversized collars were just so cool, man.

Eventually it will pass, superseded by the next fad. The >/X flood reminds me of the time when every car commercial included this feature wherein a moving car suddenly but seamlessly went into extreme slow motion for a second or two, then equally rapidly and seamlessly resumed normal speed, and the time where seemingly every commercial for a product aimed at consumers with "classy" pretensions featured a 30 second snip from Vivaldi's Four Seasons as a soundtrack. A couple of years later both those annoyances were gone.

[JoeP]

Originally Posted by lisarea

I meant for OTHER, WORSE PEOPLE.

lisarea was logged in as root!
with a default hostname!

[JoeP]

Originally Posted by Ensign Steve

Because I am a human, I am great at pattern recognition, and the thing that has been making me crazy lately is this stupid stylized X with a greater-than sign overlaid on the first half of it.

I first noticed that this men's clothing store near my house had the same X as the new Verizon XLTE logo:

[curses]

Woo, lookit dem $50 logos.

Tons of clients, especially the cheapsmaller clients will pull up a competitor's stuff and say things like "I want a logo that's different." After tons and tons of sketches and ideas, emails and maybe even a meeting at Starbucks, the client will eventually pick the first one you did, the one that looks just like the competetor, only in blue instead of red.


/coolstorybro

[Corona688]

Originally Posted by curses

Woo, lookit dem $50 logos.

Tons of clients, especially the cheapsmaller clients will pull up a competitor's stuff and say things like "I want a logo that's different." After tons and tons of sketches and ideas, emails and maybe even a meeting at Starbucks, the client will eventually pick the first one you did, the one that looks just like the competetor, only in blue instead of red.


/coolstorybro

When the client tells you what design they want, that's a gift to be appreciated and snapped up before they change their mind. If they say "I'll know it when I see it" then you're in for some serious

[Ensign Steve]

What is this I don't even

[Dingfod]

Domestic Violence the Musical - Fix the Hurt Performance

Domestic Violence the Musical? - YouTube

[Janet]

On that one, if I unfocus my eyes a bit it looks like a three dimensional X seen from slightly to the left of it.