All rise. UI Court is now in session, the Honorable Judge Patricia Semantics presiding. Today’s defendant is a company logo that was asked to be “more prominent” during a design review and took the request very seriously.
The defendant entered the courtroom first. It filled the entire doorway, and everyone else had to wait in the hall.
The charges
The clerk read three counts into the record.
- Occupying the entire first screen. On a laptop, the logo fills most of the view. On a phone, it is the view.
- Burying the reasons people came. The hours, the phone number, the pricing, and the sign-in link were all found below the fold, behind a photo of the building.
- Failing to do a logo’s one job. When the bailiff, a focus ring, tabbed through the header, it skipped the logo entirely. The defendant doesn’t link to the home page.
The defendant pleaded not guilty and asked the court reporter to note its preferred clear space.
Opening statements
Prosecution: Your Honor, everyone who lands on this page already knows whose website it is. They typed the company’s name into a search bar, or they clicked a link that had the name in it. Nobody needs a reminder that tall.
Defense: My client is the brand. It took an agency fourteen months, three rounds of feedback, and a custom typeface. It deserves to be seen.
Judge Semantics: It will be seen. The court is asking whether it needs to be seen at nine hundred pixels tall.
The witnesses
A visitor named Carol testified first. She had been sitting in a parking lot, on her phone, trying to find out whether the store was open.
“I scrolled past the logo,” she said, “then past the building, then past a paragraph about our values since 1987. The hours were in the footer, next to the copyright.” She called the store instead. Nobody answered, because it was closed.
The prosecution then called the brand guidelines PDF.
Prosecution: Do your guidelines say how large the logo should be?
Brand guidelines: Section 4.2 sets a minimum size, and clear space equal to the height of the letter O on every side.
Prosecution: And a maximum size?
Brand guidelines: We didn’t think anyone would need one.
Next, the phone number was brought up from the footer. It squinted at the courtroom lights. “Nobody visits me down there,” it said. “The people who need me look me up on a map app instead.”
The defense called the business owner, who said the homepage makes them proud. “When I open the site, I want to see who we are.”
On cross-examination, the prosecution asked how often the owner opens the site. “Every morning,” they said. And how often does a customer open it? “Once, I guess. When they need something.”
The courtroom was quiet. The owner looks at the website like a sign on the building. Customers use it like the front desk.
The verdict
The jury found the giant logo guilty on all three counts. The foreperson added that the logo is very nice, and nobody in the jury box disputes that.
Sentencing
Judge Semantics handed down the following sentence:
- The logo moves to the header. It is sized to sit comfortably next to the navigation, and it links to the home page, where people expect it.
- The first screen answers the top reasons people visit. To find them, check site search terms, the questions the front desk gets on the phone, and the messages that come through the contact form. For a restaurant, that’s probably the hours, the menu, and reservations. For a software company, it’s what the product does, the pricing, and the sign-in link.
- The brand shows up across the whole page, through its colors, type, photography, and the way the copy sounds. A visitor can recognize a company without its logo filling the screen.
- The brand guidelines PDF is ordered to add a maximum size. “Put it in section 4.3,” the judge said, “right after the letter O.”
Court is adjourned. The logo asked to be carried out of the courtroom on everyone’s shoulders. It was escorted to the header instead, where it fits nicely and can still see everything.
This case is part of the UI Court series.