[Spencer]

Congratulations to the BBC for winning Broadcaster of the Year 1997.

x.com 

[VMPhil]

Congratulations to the BBC for winning Broadcaster of the Year 1997.

x.com 

Ooh, you forget sometimes just how good that logo is until you see a large version of it.

[chaose]

Ooh, you forget sometimes just how good that logo is until you see a large version of it.

Wasn't that exactly why it was replaced?

The 1997 logo really shines when it's nice and big. But in smaller digital applications, the new version is much more legible.

[VMPhil]

Wasn't that exactly why it was replaced?

The 1997 logo really shines when it's nice and big. But in smaller digital applications, the new version is much more legible.

No, it was replaced because someone decided that the Reith font needed to be used in the logo.

It is objectively not more legible at smaller sizes, because the letters in the boxes are much smaller. Therefore reducing the new logo to smaller sizes makes it harder to read than the old logo.

[chinamug]

It's not surprising as the mistake has been made by NYF Radio Awards. It's hard not to win an award with this lot.

[chaose]

It is objectively not more legible at smaller sizes, because the letters in the boxes are much smaller. Therefore reducing the new logo to smaller sizes makes it harder to read than the old logo.

Letter size is not the only factor when it comes to legibility. Stroke thickness, open letterforms and especially margins are equally important, if not more important.

[ViridianFan]

Wasn't that exactly why it was replaced?

The 1997 logo really shines when it's nice and big. But in smaller digital applications, the new version is much more legible.

The 1997 logo was designed to be legible at all sizes as the 1988 logo didn’t work when used in smaller sizes. The new logo has a similar problem now with the bs.

[Mike]

The extra line on the Gill Sans Medium is what makes the 1997 (1996 drawn) logo so good, along with proportioned rectangles.

But alas, progress.

[interestednovice]

No, it was replaced because someone decided that the Reith font needed to be used in the logo.

Exactly. The smart thing to do would have been to use a special variant of Reith for the logo, thereby allowing them to get out of paying the Gill font licensing costs but avoiding the legibility issues.

They already have several variants of the Reith font, to have added a logo-specific tweaked weight and even tweaked letterforms would not have been a huge change. I don’t know why they didn’t bother if they were, as you say, adamant to have a “Reith logo”.

The current situation just doesn’t work, the Reith logo simply looks off and doesn’t work well at various sizes or against different backgrounds. It’s a legibility and usability step backwards.

[Mike]

Exactly. The smart thing to do would have been to use a special variant of Reith for the logo, thereby allowing them to get out of paying the Gill font licensing costs but avoiding the legibility issues.

We've discussed this before, but there were no licencing costs for the logotype - they even trademarked it.

While it uses Gill Sans Medium, it's actually a drawn element - which is why the original plan was to retain the blocks.