I haven't really thought about their logo this way - I have always perceived it as an arrow, not smile.

Posted by: dusoft at November 4, 2004 06:58 AM

Sometimes it's really the people who are broken. (FYI: turn that frown upside down and you have a smile again). Come on... let's have some quality posts.

Posted by: Phil at November 4, 2004 11:10 AM

It is an arrow, but it's also a smile. Note how it connects the A and Z in amazon's name.

It's "smiles from a to z".

Posted by: Citizen Of Trantor at November 4, 2004 11:46 AM

Your cheek muscle wouldn't contract like that when you frown.

Posted by: RotJ at November 5, 2004 01:36 AM

Wait. If it was a smile, you'd get the arrow heads at both ends. Then it would be "a smile between A and Z", which, of course, makes no sense. In it's correct orientation, it appears to be more of a smirk. "Look, look! We're smirking at you while you buy our stuff from A to Z!"

I also happen to agree with Phil. Few logos will look correct when oriented upside-down. However, even when rotated the wrong way, you can still fairly easily identify it as an Amazon package, even from a distance, without having to be able to read it. Thus it is doing its job perfectly well, and is quite the opposite of broken.

Posted by: Brian Kofford at November 5, 2004 02:32 AM

I agree with Phil and Brian, lately there have been really annoying posts being added. Were there about customer exprience? No. Stop it, you don't have to post every day. We have RSS, so we can wait and read when there is something new even after week. Quality, not quantity.

Posted by: dusoft at November 5, 2004 09:45 AM

A frown is a smile turned upside-down.

Posted by: Chris at November 5, 2004 06:18 PM

Dusoft (and Brian and Phil) -- I have to disagree, I think this *is* a customer experience issue.

Once the idea had been floated at Amazon to use the simple arrow as a logo on their packaging, how many people do you think were involved in approving and implementing it? And of those people, how many stopped to think of the end product as being a physical object, in the real world, handled by human beings, rather than just an image on a computer screen? Evidently, if any did, they were ignored, or overruled, or maybe just unwilling to speak up.

This is what is broken: Corporate process and culture that neglects to acknowledge that there *is* a customer experience at all. Sometimes this merely leads to amusing side effects, like packaging that frowns at you. Sometimes it's a lot more frustrating, like the Amazon price sorting issues (and other website problems) that were discussed back in September. But it all stems from the same source, and I think it's all worth discussing.

Posted by: E.T. at November 8, 2004 11:20 AM

That's just a bad design. They should do a bit more thinking!

Posted by: Taco boy at November 12, 2004 10:03 PM

The arrow isn't just a logo. It also points to the place where you tear open the package.

I think that's pretty clever.

Posted by: Jason at November 15, 2004 03:44 PM

hmm.. doesnt seem THAT bad

Posted by: fat haed at December 26, 2004 12:50 AM