It’s also ironic, perhaps, that the exclusive nature of a logo is actually necessary for the act of subverting it, too. You can’t use the Nike logo or the Shell logo against the company in protest if it isn’t a mark that’s exclusive to them in the first place.
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Very well put.
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I think you leave out the desirable and inevitable function of logos – to become the basis of the new religion. In the future we will all be slaves of a new Theocracy based on a Cult of Commercial Style over Substance. We will be happier, you know this to be true.
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Personally I hope it’s this one.

An excerpt from my blog post:
“With my Government 2.0 Taskforce hat on, my response is please participate, not so that we get something for free, but so that you can contribute to an important process of democracy. If everyone who will contribute to the taskforce over the next 6 months demands fees for their services there would be no task force members, no new ideas, no participation and no change.”

http://www.lisaharvey.com.au

Is the position now that only an idiot would enter without receiving at least a little cold hard cash? That’s the clear implication of your comment, Fine.

We really don’t need to label all entrants as ‘suckers’, you know. Better simply to recognise the obvious fact that for many graphic designers it will be in their interests (and in the public interest, by the way) to enter this ‘competition’, even though a by-product of their entry is probably to exert downward pressure on the profits of other (likely more well-established) graphic designers.

BBB

Clearly if someone is willing to do the work that is required to enter this ‘competition’, then they value the benefits (e.g. experience, exposure) at greater than the costs (e.g. in time, opportunity cost), and therefore the ‘favours’ cut both ways. What you are really saying is that you personally would never do the cost/benefit analysis and come out on the side of contributing for $0, and therefore if someone else does it is reflective of some undesirable attitude (on the part of both acquirer and supplier).

A lot of the comments here are really about private interests vs. the public interest. Clearly it is in the public interest to spend as little as possible on graphic design (so long as the results are still fit for purpose). However, a ‘competition’ of the kind being discussed here threatens the profits of private graphic designers (sorry, “workers”). If the net result is that the public can rely on amateurs or newly-minted professionals (using that term loosely) to produce acceptable graphic design forever more, then all the better for the public.

Finally, isn’t the inconvenient truth here that while truly great graphic design requires highly skilled individuals, graphic design that is merely ‘good enough’ (certainly for Gruen’s purposes) is actually very easy to come by, and thus its price is very low indeed.

BBB

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tux

Logos are inherently connected to trademark. Free floating signifiers can’t really be logos. If you could put a swoosh on everything it wouldn’t make sense to use it as a logo. The process is cultural as well as legal I guess.

True, which is why I’m arguing that you can’t see a logo design contest in the same way as an open source initiative, because the contest-holders are asking for something that can’t be public property if it’s to do the job it’s needed for.

It’s also ironic, perhaps, that the exclusive nature of a logo is actually necessary for the act of subverting it, too. You can’t use the Nike logo or the Shell logo against the company in protest if it isn’t a mark that’s exclusive to them in the first place.