I guess I don’t need to go into too much detail about what happened here over the weekend. I wasn’t in town on Saturday, but I live and work in the neighborhood and have been down there many times on Saturday nights. Generally there are a lot of people in and out of the bars as well as a number of people who are just hanging around outside. Smoking, talking, just hanging out, whatever. So, as I said, I wasn’t there on Saturday, but I’ve seen the same video that you’ve seen. A fight obviously broke out, but from the kind of crappy video, how can you tell what the hell is even going on? I can’t even tell exactly how many people are fighting. There are more people standing on the sidelines watching and some women trying to break it up.

Point one: this was not a brawl or a riot, as I’ve seen it called on a couple of media outlets. It was a fight that spilled into the street. I’ve seen the same thing at several other bars on the street. It’s a sad-but-true fact of life that people fight in bars. Why do they fight? Because sometimes it is important to show you that I am, in fact, way more awesome than you. Speaking of bar fights, there is one bar on the street (not one of the bars that plays dance music, by the way) that has had a fight 2 out of the past 3 times I’ve been in there (in the past 3–4 weeks). One of the fights even spilled out onto the sidewalk. Where is all of the hand-wringing over that fight?

Come to think of it, the last fight that I can remember that got this out of hand didn’t happen at one of the dance bars either and involved mostly white guys, if I recall correctly. And in the case of that fight, it stemmed from a wedding reception and they actually did some property damage (which Saturday night’s fight didn’t do, I don’t think). Again, where was the hand-wringing? Where were the calls to shut down wedding receptions with country music?

There weren’t any, of course. Why not? Because Saturday night’s incident involved a bunch of black guys. And that brings me to this…

Point two: It makes me sad to see the number of comments with racist undertones (and some not-so-subtle comments) regarding this fight. Not just this fight, either, but with the overall neighborhood the past few months. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard someone make a comment regarding the neighborhood “getting a little dark at night” and I’ve also heard the n-word dropped more frequently over the past few months than I’ve heard in years. I’m hearing these thoughts and worse from people who you’d be pretty surprised to hear it from.

As far as comments on Facebook and the forums on mlive.com, connectmidmichigan.com go, I don’t even know what to say. It’s embarassing how poorly educated and ignorant people are sometimes. What do you think all of those comments about Bay City turning into another Saginaw or Flint are? Do you think they’re talking about crime rate? No, that’s code for black people. One idiot even suggested (jokingly, I hope) gating the city. What a douche.

Point three: Is Midland Street dangerous? No, it’s not. Somebody asked me today if I thought it was getting more dangerous and I rejected the question because it’s not dangerous down here. There have been more fights the past five or six months, but only a couple that have gotten really out of hand. And I’ve seen more fights involving white people than anything else, but we have to make a big deal out of this one? The problem on Midland Street on Saturday night wasn’t that they were black, it’s that they were drunk. If you don’t think that’s the truth, then why wasn’t there an uproar over the wedding party fight?

Point four: The Westown is taking a lot of heat, which is not entirely fair. Westown is the only nightclub (I use the term loosely, mostly because it’s the theatre I saw Footloose in, but it’s as close as we’ve got to a real nightclub), but they are hardly the only bar playing dance/hip-hop music. And they’re not the only bar who draws a crowd which includes African-Americans. I keep reading quotes how nobody is pointing the finger, but when I see people saying that they aren’t pointing the finger? Guess whose marquee is behind them on TV? And guess whose photo they choose to run on mlive.com?

Point five: This is an issue for ALL liquor-licensed and late-night businesses. Just because you don’t play dance music doesn’t mean that you’re not part of this, too. I know that when it comes time to talk about paying for additional security, there are going to be some bar owners who are going to pitch a fit over it and try to pass it all off on Westown and maybe a couple of other establishments, but that’s a joke. I’ve heard people in other establishments making comments about the number of black people (that’s not the word they used) on the street. I’ve heard the people working in these same establishments making the same comments. And I’ve heard people make  under-their-breath, racist comments out on the street. How long until that turns into a fight? Maybe you don’t own the powder keg, but you’re handing out books of matches pretty freely.

I think the city and the liquor-license holders—all of them—have a shared responsibility here. The problem is that you can’t get the liquor license holders to agree on anything. Lots of egos in the room and lots of bickering. The bars who cater to the sports-and-a-beer crowd don’t feel they should have to pay extra because some bars have a different crowd, but the fact of the matter is that the more people who are down here, the better it is for everybody.

Point six: The city needs to do more. I know that they’re crying bankrupt, but something has to be done. On Friday and especially Saturday nights, Midland Street is the highest concentration of people in Bay City. Add in youth, add in alcohol, add in a racial mix and how can the BCPD turn a blind eye to it?

I am not an expert on city finances or anything like that, but I know that the budget is stretched way past thin. The police have a police reserve that they use for crowd control during big events. Can a combination of officers and reservists walk a beat? I think there should be a police presence late weekend nights anyway because this is a highly trafficked area at that time, so it would make sense that this is where some police should be. Maybe you have to pass on any additional cost on to the late-night businesses (I don’t know that it’s fair to pass it on to the many businesses who aren’t open at night).

It’s important to note here, that you can’t blame the police, either. In the past, some bar owners told the city (at Midland Street District meetings) that they didn’t want too heavy of a police presence here because it might scare people away.

Point seven: Kevin Novellino is a friend and I support his right to say what he wants and I genuinely understand his anger, but as a neighborhood business owner and a city commissioner, I think he had better ways to handle this without giving people the impression that Midland Street is dangerous. I share Kevin’s frustration because, like Kevin, I want our neighborhood to make everybody feel comfortable and I think it’s reckless to just put a video out there on Facebook.

There was supposed to be a meeting last week with district business people along with Kevin, the chief of police and somebody else in city management, but Kevin wasn’t able to deliver on his assurance that he’d have the chief of police and city manager there. Not only that, but he didn’t bother to show up himself. So to say that nobody is listening is pretty disingenuous.

Point eight: Finally! Something to get people all riled up about on local news! Thank goodness for the local news. Winter is still at least a few weeks away. If it weren’t for this story of danger lurking in our friendly bar district, what ever could we use to scare the citizenry. Better stock up on bread and milk, everybody, there is a band of marauding hooligans waiting to get you!

In summary: This is a problem, but it isn’t an unsolvable problem. It might not be easy to come to a solution, though, because there are so many egos involved. At some point, all of the interested parties—neighborhood businesses, property owners, representatives from the city and police—need to sit down and talk about what can be done to improve safety on the street. Whether that will happen or not is the real question. The glacial pace of progress in Bay City is really not going to do us any favors, that’s for sure.

I feel like I probably didn’t say everything that I meant to, but I do feel better after writing it. Thanks for reading.

Does anybody remember when America Online was the 400-pound gorilla of the online world? There were many ways to go online, but AOL made the whole process very easy. AOL put together a marketing plan that included mailing CDs with their software to every man, woman, child and family pet in North America. The plan worked, though, as people were signing up as fast as AOL could send the CDs out. For years, this was the first thing you saw on the screen, just before hearing the ubiquitous, “You’ve got mail.”

While the logo isn’t great, it’s not horrible, either. It’s just sort of there. I know that a lot of designers really hated this logo, but to be honest, I was on AOL before I was designer so the logo is very familiar to me. It’s not great, but it brings back good memories from the early days of the internet (granted, 1991 wasn’t that long ago, but it was still long before many people knew much about it).

As AOL continued to grow (and grow and grow), they decided to updated the logo to be more in step with the time. In 2004, the logo was given a more contemporary feel. Strangely, the new logo was to be part of the 20th anniversary celebration of AOL, but that was still seven years in the future.

Fast forward to 2009 and we’re still 2 years shy of the 20th anniversary and AOL finds itself facing a business climate change which they didn’t anticipate. Between DSL, cable modems, wireless networks and so forth, the need to have a dedicated service to connect to the internet is no more. There are still people who use AOL, but the numbers are WAY DOWN from the good, old days. AOL needs to find a way to make themselves relevant in order to survive in the current environment. Step one in that process is, apparently, a major rebranding. Behold the future…

…that’s right, it’s a goldfish. In other versions of the logo the goldfish is replaced with a green scribble, some sort of weird brain thing or any of many other little icons with an updated type treatment. AOL’s big branding brains came up with a whole slew of icons. Their explanation (excuse, is more like it) for this is that AOL is a 21st century media company and that required a brand that is “open and generous.”

Um…yeah…whatever. Just call it what it is…we don’t know who the hell we are, who we’re supposed to be or what you want us to be. So we’ll just be everything.

Can you believe some people get paid to come up with a goldfish with type on top of it? Assuming they were paid for the design work (and I use design loosely), they should be locked up for larceny.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then you can consider me quite flattered. Imagine my surprise recently when I saw a couple of ideas clearly lifted straight from the 989 Design portfolio.

This is, of course, the 989 Design logo:

Then as I was browing one day, I see this:

Ad Index guys, you’re embarassing me with your clear imitation of my logo. I did, after all, invent the red circle with reversed out characters.

And then to further the flattery, I refer you to the Great Lakes Loons Man of Steal poster:

Four or five weeks later, I was sitting in Brewtopia when I spotted the cover of the new Tri-City Magazine:

Stop it, you guys, you’re making me blush! I really appreciate that so many people have taken the time to mimic my work but you’re embarrassing me with all of this imitation.

Okay, to be clear, I’m being very tongue-in-cheek about this. Neither Ad Index nor Tri-City Magazine copied my work. There are trends in design and there are good ideas that happen simultaneously. Each of these is a case of  coincidence. It’s just dumb luck that I spotted the Ad Index logo (haven’t been able to find it since), but when I saw it the 989 logo was the first thing I thought of. As far as the TCM cover, that’s just a funny coincidence that we each had a Superman idea at the same time. I’ll take my Superman over theirs, though, because while Mike (on the magazine cover) is a great guy and a great golfer, Dee is going to be playing for the Dodgers one day.

Have you heard that Simpsons matriarch Marge Simpson will be the first-ever cartoon to grace the cover of Playboy? In addition to the cover, she is given a few pages inside the book complete with data sheet and a two-page centerfold. You can read more about it at NPR.org.

Personally, I think it’s pretty funny and it’s a GREAT promotional coup for The Simpsons, who are celebrating their 20th anniversary on Fox this year. Thing is, it sounds like it wasn’t Fox’s idea. Sounds like the idea came from Playboy who wanted to try to draw more 20-something readers to the magazine, whose readers have a median age of around 35.

Why Marge Simpson, though? The Simpsons is still a solid enough performer on Fox, but the series is decidedly in decline. And I can’t quote viewership statistics, but my feeling is that the younger readers they are trying to appeal to aren’t necessarily Simpsons fans. My guess is that if they watch the Simpsons, they only do it to kill time until Family Guy comes on.

Family Guy skews much younger and with it’s edgier humor would seem to be a better fit for what Playboy is going for. Maybe the problem is that Playboy’s folks are skewing a lot older themselves and can’t be bothered to stay up past 9PM. Or, worse yet—and more likely—they’re too busy watching Desperate Housewives.

I like the idea behind the cartoon cover and giving a few pages on the inside—I’m even sure that the novelty will give Playboy a nice, one-issue sales bump—but I think those buyers are going to be in the 30-45 age range. If anything, the median reader age may go up for an issue.

Overall idea: B+
Probability of giving the magazine a short-term (one issue?) sales increase: 80%
Probability of achieving stated goal of drawing younger readers in: 15%

Overall grade (for Simpsons): A

Overall grade (for Playboy): F-
I would have given a C- because it is a fun idea and will result in a temporary sales bump, but they kind of botched when it comes to drawing in the younger crowd.

I received an e-mail a couple of weeks ago that Tri-City Monthly Lifestyle Magazine is changing its name to Great Lakes Bay Regional Lifestyle Magazine. This rebranding comes within a couple of years of the magazine’s previous rebranding project. Launched 5 or 6 years ago as Interlude, the magazine wanted a greater regional appeal so they settled on Tri-City Magazine. I never cared for the name Interlude, so even the unimaginative Tri-City Magazine was a change for the better.

For any established institution to undertake a rebranding project is a pretty big deal and to do it twice in two years is a risky proposition. Any momentum you have gained with the initial rebrand stands to suffer a little bit with a second rebrand. On top of that, changing the name and then changing it again so soon after will give some people an impression that the magazine is not stable or lacks direction. In the magazine’s defense, due to some big internal changes, I can attest to the fact that they are now probably more stable than they’ve ever been. With the recent changes as well as the editorial changes that took place a couple of years ago, I think the overall content and presentation are better now than they’ve ever been.

While I don’t like the idea of rebranding so hot on the heels of another rebrand, my real issue isn’t that they’re changing the name again, but what they’re changing the name to. Great Lakes Bay Regional Lifestyle Magazine? Really? I have to admit that I am surprised that Tri-City drank the Kool-Aid on this one. When the local communities first unveiled “Great Lakes Bay Region” as the new name for the regional brand, I wasn’t particularly wowed by it. I think the name is way too long, doesn’t lend itself well to certain applications, and I don’t much care for the logo. In branding terms, that’s three strikes against you.

Right away, though,you saw a lot of businesses jumping on board. Public radio quit calling it the Tri-Cities and started using the GLBR moniker. Newspapers quickly updated their style guides to push the new regional brand. My problem with the magazine changing their name, though, is that I think they are the first business to make the regional brand a part of their identity. In effect, they let somebody else name their business. And until then you are saddled with a magazine name that’s as long as an entry in the dictionary.

I don’t think you’re ever going to see an everyday person on the street refer to this region as the Great Lakes Bay Region. As I’ve written about (at length)—it’s just not a great name. There’s no tongue appeal to it. It’s not sexy. It’s just…wordy. Try slipping Great Lakes Bay Region into casual conversation. It’s not easy to do without sounding like you’re selling something. What happens in a few years if this brand doesn’t catch on and people just stop using it? Do you change your name again?

This name change just seems like they are trying to fall in line with what the regional chambers of commerce want. Why let somebody from outside dictate what your identity is? What’s next? Give the chambers final editorial approval on the articles and ads? We’re not talking Woodward & Bernstein here, but tying a publication too tightly to local business interests takes away any appearance of journalistic integrity.

I think Tri-City would have done well to just leave it alone and keep their name. Or, if they are really committed to rebranding, take some time and actually come up with a solid identity. There are some really talented and creative folks working at the magazine, they could come up with something great if they were given the opportunity.