[dbl]

Watching Drama this morning, I've noticed the UKTV Play logo at the end of trailers has changed from blue to rd, is that the first stage of this rebrand?

Yep, you're correct, it's a transition to the U Rebrand

[ViridianFan]

I am questioning why everyone seems to be picking Wolff Olsin to do their rebrands. I’ve been looking through their work and have to say that I’m not impressed with any of it. It’s looks generic and bland (Johnson & Johnson’s new logo & the bbc) or they have this obsession with “joining the dots”. When you also realise they created the London 2012 logo it all starts to make sense.

[CATV]

I find company's go with trending design agency's rather than actually researching a agency that will be a good fit. Another example of we haven't got time (AKA we can't be bothered and don't think it's work out time) to look around just use them. Shame really. I want to know what BBC Creative pitched to the BBC that got rejected.

Also noticed not sure if it's been said that u.co.uk redirects to UKTV Play. u.com and u.uk not secured.

I get what they were trying to do with 'U' but it's just not worked. Clearly they want to move on from just being TV but if they are willing to change the name and get rid of UKTV why not go for something original. Your making the change why not. No one unless your interested is going to know U is a nod to UKTV so what's the point. Do something different. I got ideas I sure others have to.

[Brekkie]

Hard to say the Lomdon 2012 logo was generic and bland. Indeed it's main criticism was that it wasn't. In the end it did the job superbly.

And at least it wasn't O&London.

[WillPS]

I find company's go with trending design agency's rather than actually researching a agency that will be a good fit. Another example of we haven't got time (AKA we can't be bothered and don't think it's work out time) to look around just use them. Shame really. I want to know what BBC Creative pitched to the BBC that got rejected.

Also noticed not sure if it's been said that u.co.uk redirects to UKTV Play. u.com and u.uk not secured.

I get what they were trying to do with 'U' but it's just not worked. Clearly they want to move on from just being TV but if they are willing to change the name and get rid of UKTV why not go for something original. Your making the change why not. No one unless your interested is going to know U is a nod to UKTV so what's the point. Do something different. I got ideas I sure others have to.

I'm not sure I buy the argument that they need to prove they're "moving on from TV" by dropping the TV part of the name. Up-start competitors in the same space include Pluto TV and Freevee... it's still TV programming they show and the primary mode of viewing is on a TV set, just because they want to emphasise their non-linear broadcasting offer doesn't make their offer any less "TV" than it always has been.

Just feels straight up clumsy to me.

I appreciate the problem they have though, that by creating a dozen unique identities they now have a struggle getting brand recognition on a service which unifies them. A smarter solution would have just been to strap 'UK' on to the front of each, IMHO.

[Spencer]

I'm not sure I buy the argument that they need to prove they're "moving on from TV" by dropping the TV part of the name. Up-start competitors in the same space include Pluto TV and Freevee... it's still TV programming they show and the primary mode of viewing is on a TV set, just because they want to emphasise their non-linear broadcasting offer doesn't make their offer any less "TV" than it always has been.

Just feels straight up clumsy to me.

I appreciate the problem they have though, that by creating a dozen unique identities they now have a struggle getting brand recognition on a service which unifies them. A smarter solution would have just been to strap 'UK' on to the front of each, IMHO.

The trouble with adding UK (as they had before) is you can't copyright the name of a country, so someone else could potentially launch their own 'UK xxxx' channel or channels, making them sound to the casual viewer like they're part of UKTV, and potentially damage their reputation. I always presumed that was why they added the full UKTV prefix to channels back in 2004.

[WillPS]

The trouble with adding UK (as they had before) is you can't copyright the name of a country, so someone else could potentially launch their own 'UK xxxx' channel or channels, making them sound to the casual viewer like they're part of UKTV, and potentially damage their reputation. I always presumed that was why they added the full UKTV prefix to channels back in 2004.

I get that, but then you could presumably launch a channel called You & Style or even U and Style, right? They can't trademark the letter U can they?

[Spencer]

I get that, but then you could presumably launch a channel called You & Style or even U and Style, right? They can't trademark the letter U can they?

No, but the ‘U&’ prefix could certainly be trademarked. If other channels did try to go for a similar soundalike brand, it becomes a bit of a grey area, rather like Aldi and Lidl’s lookalike packaging, and I would have thought could be contested in court if it came to it, just as ITV probably would if someone launched a channel called ‘Eye TV’.

[interestednovice]

I'm not sure I buy the argument that they need to prove they're "moving on from TV" by dropping the TV part of the name. Up-start competitors in the same space include Pluto TV and Freevee... it's still TV programming they show and the primary mode of viewing is on a TV set, just because they want to emphasise their non-linear broadcasting offer doesn't make their offer any less "TV" than it always has been.

Just feels straight up clumsy to me.

I appreciate the problem they have though, that by creating a dozen unique identities they now have a struggle getting brand recognition on a service which unifies them. A smarter solution would have just been to strap 'UK' on to the front of each, IMHO.

I tend to agree with you. A lot of companies do seem to be obsessed with “moving on” from their existing brands, which makes no sense. Mastercard altered the version of their logo which appears on cards, for example, to no longer include the text “Mastercard” because they were “moving beyond cards”. It’s just quite silly, in my view.

TV, at it’s core, just really means home viewing (or anywhere viewing) media, contrasting with cinema content - although even that line is being blurred with streaming services producing original films. It doesn’t have to be “broadcast”, it’s still TV on demand.

[CATV]

I get what you mean about them making TV show to stream but I just think TV comes across as old fashioned. It's a bit like wireless and radio. Same thing but one sounds more modern. Also streaming is the trending word like podcast. A podcast is a audio production released on a podcast platform but everyone calls them podcast as that the trend name.