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When Mark Zuckerberg announced it last month Facebook changes its name, the company has released a stylish online animation that shows the logos of all its apps and products coming together to create a glittering vision of the future: a two-tone blue infinity symbol next to the word “meta”.

The new symbol and name change was a nod to Mr. Zuckerberg’s plans to refocus the Silicon Valley giant on what he sees as the merging of disparate digital worlds, the so-called digital worlds. metadata store, an immersive, interconnected online space largely powered by augmented and virtual reality. “The metaverse is the next frontier of connecting people,” he said. announcement.

The change made by a scandal-stricken company was the latest example of corporate America’s efforts to create less unique and ultimately less offensive brands, according to design experts. It was also a reflection of the increasing challenge for corporate identities to coexist in many different sizes and digital environments, from VR headsets to smartwatches. not yet.

“It checks a lot of boxes,” said Michael Evamy, author of “Logo,” an anthology of corporate brands and logos. “It’s very simple. It’s very visible at any scale. It’s blue.” (Blue is a color historically associated with safety and reliability. The infinity symbol, without corners and jagged edges, can be seen as threatening.)

“But in a way it looks just as you might expect,” Mr. Evamy added. “A bit overwhelming and risk-averse.”

Users and legislators around the world are increasingly scrutinizing the broad reach of Facebook, whose products are used by multiple people, including Instagram and WhatsApp. 3.6 billion people every month. Even as Facebook became one of the most valuable companies in the world, it has spent the last few years going from one embarrassing scandal to another. Most recently, a former employee became an informant. an extensive treasury of internal documentsarguing that Mr. Zuckerberg and Facebook routinely get in the way of people’s well-being.

Mr. Zuckerberg said last month that the name change is a reflection of how much Facebook has evolved. “Currently, our brand is so tightly linked to a single product that it cannot represent everything we do today, let alone the future,” he said.

Facebook has long been associated with the little “f” logo – a simple sign, but as Facebook has grown it has become globally recognized. The company’s other apps also have bold and colorful logos that remain part of the rebranding.

Since Mr. Zuckerberg’s vision for the future is based on virtual reality, the company wanted a new logo that felt more dynamic and immersive. In March, the company began developing a logo with Zach Stubenvoll, Sam Halle, and Marian Chiao focusing on “exploring concepts with only movement, dimensionality, and perspective.” members of the interior design team, in an email.

When using a VR headset, people often use a controller to delineate their virtual experience. Meta’s designers said that the color cycle in the new logo, which eventually turns into the infinity symbol, was inspired by these border lines.

The response to Facebook’s change by the design community has been largely muted.

“This symbol doesn’t get you excited about the metaverse,” said Mr. Evamy. “The opportunity they missed is to produce something truly exciting and transformative in its own way.”

Many other brands have very similar infinity symbol logos, including web development software sold by Microsoft, a model of Top Flite golf balls, an asset management company, and rock band Hoobastank. A service owned by Meta called Boomerang also uses an infinity symbol.

“An infinity loop isn’t very unique,” he said. Jessica Walsh, the founder and creative director of design studio & Walsh. “However, unlike many brands, they are in a privileged position where they don’t need to rely on their logo to be distinctive to be memorable.”

Paula Scher, a partner at Pentagram, a design consultancy whose clients include Bloomberg, Citibank and Tiffany, said there is increasing pressure for corporate brand logos to be mobile and multidimensional. For example, a few years ago, Google added animation to its logo. But Ms. Scher pointed out the risks of making a logo more flexible, making it less recognizable.

Rodrigo CorralThe book cover designer, who has also worked with rapper Jay-Z and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, often incorporates animation into his design work for clients. “But the logo must stand on its own,” he warned. “He has to work still first.”

In recent years, brands have had to adapt their logos and identities to a wider array of digital platforms. As websites that were once viewed only on desktop computers gave way to smartphone apps, logos had to work in smaller and smaller contexts – tiny squares and circles in social media feeds or miniature dots on smartwatches. Virtual reality offers another platform that brands can adapt to, defined as motion and 3D in nature.

Mr. Evamy noted that the new Meta logo departs from an era where corporate branding was much more evocative. Pointing to the iconic lines of IBM or the hidden arrow inside FedEx’s name, he said, “In the past, big companies produced symbols that were very bold, exciting, striking and would stop you on the way.”

But while a company like FedEx traditionally has to deal with branding in a delivery truck and TV commercials, Meta resides predominantly in the digital world across a variety of platforms.

It is a relatively unexplored territory. There is little precedent for corporate logos that can exist in 3D in a virtual space that a user can interact with and manipulate.

“Our meta design system is designed to grow and change with the company and as the metastore is created,” the meta design team said in the email. “We needed to prepare the symbol for the future.”