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Have you ever heard of Highlight? I hope the answer is no, because the incoherent “social” app has a logo that’s so horrible it will actually give you a headache. A physical headache, in your head. It’s dangerously bad.
TechCrunch says the app—which is a mish mosh of social bullshit, allowing you to tag people, highlight things, upload photos, geo-kiss your mother, I don’t even know—is making “Another Bid For SoLoMo Supremacy.” Do you know what that means? I hope the answer to that is also no, because it means nothing. It means absolutely nothing.
It means absolutely. Nothing.
But even if it did mean something, this app has screwed itself into a position worse than hell’s lake of fire, because it’s covered with a logo that actively makes you want to look away from it. Even the app’s icon is retina-offensive. If you are ever thinking of designing an app, or a website, or literally anything, make sure it doesn’t look like someone welded 3D glasses to your face and them bombarded you with gamma rays. [TechCrunch]
For once the headline is not only correct but so accurate that Sam deserves a prize…damn that does hurt my brain looking at it.
Even the thumbnail on the right hand side is bad!
My first thought when I read the headline was “that’s a bit harsh”. Then I glanced at the logo in question and lost a cluster of retinal cells. I gasped in horror, transfixed by the hellish apparition in front of me. “Must…. look… away….” I growled through gritted teeth. By then it was too late, my sight was all but gone. Could those bionic eyes coming to market this week be just a coincidence? Could ‘Highlight’ be an evil marketing ploy to drum up business for the Argus II?
Seriously though, what a horrific logo.
This is either a really shit logo or a brilliant PR strategy. Every tech website in the world has been covering the company and the logo because of how bad it is.
The app sounds pretty bad too, maybe they made the shitty logo so that people wouldn’t notice that.
I feel like I’m having a seizure, looking at that thing. Way to get coverage for your app, guys!
Unbelievable. I already have bad eyes and I had to blink heavily and rub them after a second or two. I’ve had to scroll it off the page to even read the article.
I was just replying to your last comment on the Google Glasses before looking at this. I had exactly the same reaction, my eyes went immediately out of focus. Wondered if you would have had the same.
Completely, and my eye muscles starting fighting against it. Awful. Started to feel dizzy.
I didn’t get the dizziness but definately an uncomfortable feeling. As you say, awful.
Just like you described, it actually made me shudder and I couldn’t look at it for longer than a couple of seconds.
My folks visited last night and they said the same, it’s a massively poorly thought out design. As a part-time graphic designer myself I can’t imagine what they were thinking.
I had the same reaction, They’re obviously Glass-ist.
My head hurts.
Agreed.
If it hurts to look at it for just a few seconds, I imagine that the guy that designed this is now permanently blind.
As some commenter on the American side pointed out, this app was chosen as one of Gizmodo’s Best Apps of 2012 back in January last year!
Slight correction: It was one of the Essential Apps of January 2012 http://gizmodo.com/5881007/the-new-essential-apps-january-2012
But it’s still on Gizmodo’s Best iPhone Apps list! http://gizmodo.com/5676549/the-best-iphone-apps
The opinions of different writers don’t have to line up…this isn’t a newspaper with a political agenda.
On a side note, thanks Gizmodo, I’m now blinded for the day! Good excuse to take a day off though and drive home. Oh wait, now I can’t, because I’m blind.
Without wanting to be the black sheep for the sake of it, I actually quite like it.
Admittedly i feel milliseconds away from a seizure every time I look at it, but that’s kind of fun… and definitely different.
It’s the first time i’ve seen a non-animated logo have the qualities usually restricted to print based logo design. A sort of weird tangibility for the eyes.
That shit makes my eyes burn.
It’s doing my head in!
I like it!*
*no, I dont
It’s bad.. but no worse than the Gizmodo logo (and Tech Crunch). Just shut up.
I’m pretty sure neither Gizmodo or TechCrunch logos have induced an epileptic seizure in anyone. This one on the other hand…
I can sense a class action suit in the US brewing – “I was riding my motorbike and looked at the app and had a dizzy turn and crashed” or “I was sawing a piece of timber and decided to share a photo of it with my friend and had a dizzy turn and I now have a circular saw in my forehead”
Don’t.Follow.The.Lights
I find if you put your hand under the desk and squint/gurn at the screen it looks alright…
At least that’s the excuse I’m using at my tribunal…
It took me a while to figure this out (initially my eyes would instinctively focus out so I couldn’t see it) but from a typographical standpoint it’s actually kinda clever, even if it is horrible from a design/visual perspective.
(For anyone not able/willing to try and focus on it it’s ‘highlight’ overlaid upon itself in separate CMYK channels, creating the ‘fringe’ effect that solidifies into the word we read)
Sign outside the opticians ‘Do you need an eye test?’ $$$