Favicons are the new logos

An article from Some Random Dude got me thinking. Are logos really a dying format?

I opened up the top 9 “online” brands in Chrome to take a look. I was umming and ahhing about the meanings of brands, marques, identities and logos, and came down on the side that brands exist more online without traditional logo devices. Why? Hard to say exactly. Maybe it is because the companies are young and don’t yet have a fully fledged brand identities. Maybe they don’t bother because the web was built on text information, everyone sees the name written down and linked from, so lets just use that and make it look nice.

Can you name the nine brands?

I wandered off to get a coffee and noticed something when I came back. Every tab had an icon in it from which I could I could immediately tell which site and brand was which. This is where brands can start to get online value from logos. And 16 pixel square logos at that.

So yes, logos are relevant online, but the nature of online company logos is different. Leading companies need to be identifiable by a small square icon. The parameters for logos may be shifting, but the requirement for logos is still there.