5 reasons Hillary Clinton's new logo is causing controversy

In possibly the least surprising political story of the year, Hillary Clinton yesterday declared she's officially running for US President. This not being a political blog, though, we're more interested in the new logo design she's released along with the announcement. And it seems some of you quite like it...

As is the way with social media, though, others have found much to criticise. Here we've grouped the main complaints into five easy-to-follow categories...

01. It's 'stolen' from WikiLeaks

Secrets-sharing site WikiLeaks generally has a pretty relaxed attitude to ownership and intellectual property. So we think there's probably a certain amount of tongue in cheek from this plagiarism complaint. Either way, not everyone is convinced...

02. It 'looks like a hospital sign'

When you're campaigning for the leadership of the Free World, it's generally best to avoid associations with death, injury and illness. So it's perhaps unfortunate that the main thing that leaps to mind on seeing Hillary's new logo is a medical facility...

03. It symbolises a 'shift to the right'

When it comes to politics you can't get much more basic than the left/right metaphor – and so we can't believe the designers didn't know what associations would draw from the arrow in this logo. Social media users certainly haven't missed the irony...

04. It contains other 'hidden messages'

The last point aside, when it comes to symbolism in politics you can read pretty much anything into a design that you want to see. And the jokers and conspiracy theorists have been predictably out in force with this one...

05. It's "amateurish"

Is Hillary's logo a masterful example of the 'keep it simple, stupid' concept in action? Or is just simple and stupid? While the Twitter audience is not necessarily known for being balanced, thoughtful and fair, it's still interesting to see some of the initial reactions which, it has to be said, were almost overwhelmingly negative...

But what do you think of the logo? We'd love to see your views in the comments below!

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Tom May

Tom May is an award-winning journalist and editor specialising in design, photography and technology. Author of the Amazon #1 bestseller Great TED Talks: Creativity, published by Pavilion Books, Tom was previously editor of Professional Photography magazine, associate editor at Creative Bloq, and deputy editor at net magazine. Today, he is a regular contributor to Creative Bloq and its sister sites Digital Camera World, T3.com and Tech Radar. He also writes for Creative Boom and works on content marketing projects.