Closed Bug 628463 Opened 13 years ago Closed 13 years ago

Icon for Adblock Plus

Categories

(Marketing :: Design, task)

task
Not set
normal

Tracking

(Not tracked)

RESOLVED WONTFIX

People

(Reporter: fligtar, Assigned: smartell)

Details

Attachments

(3 files)

I discussed this with Sean a few months ago, but wanted to file a bug so it's not forgotten and hopefully to get it prior to Firefox 4.

Adblock Plus was the top winner of our icon makeover contest this summer, and unfortunately our graphic design intern left before finishing Adblock Plus's new icon. We still need to deliver an icon to ABP, and as their current icon doesn't scale very well, we need it for Firefox 4.

Wladimir's brief is below:
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There is an oddity with the Adblock Plus icon - it isn't just an icon but a status indicator as well. Different icons are used to indicate the three possible states (red stop sign for "enabled", grey stop sign for "disabled" and green sign for "generally enabled but disabled on this page only"). The status images currently used are https://hg.adblockplus.org/adblockplus/raw-file/d91508b9561f/chrome/skin/abp-status.png and https://hg.adblockplus.org/adblockplus/raw-file/d91508b9561f/chrome/skin/abp-status-16.png, the actual extension icon is https://hg.adblockplus.org/adblockplus/raw-file/d91508b9561f/icon.png. I also have an SVG version that I attached to this mail (it's a modified version of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Adblockplus_icon.svg to make the shape entirely regular).

These icons were instantiated after a lengthy forum discussion (https://adblockplus.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=517 - yes, that's 14 pages) and replaced the "cockroach" icons (http://userstyles.org/styles/1196). The main problem was user confusion: some expected the icon to represent Adblock Plus state (enabled vs. disabled), others expected it to indicate ad state (blocked vs. unblocked). The two interpretations arrive on opposite results which ruled out any icons based on traffic lights or anything else leaving room for interpretation.

The stop sign analogy was rather successful however, there were very few complains about its meaning being ambiguous. The only problems usually concerned the "disabled on this page" state - it isn't obvious what the green color means, some people also criticize that this icon has a different shape (https://www.mozdev.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=22270).

The text displayed in the icon (ABP) turned out unproblematic despite my original worry that the connection to Adblock Plus might not always be obvious. However, three letters are way too much - they only display properly in the 32x32 variant and are already blurry in 24x24. And the 16x16 version (or scaled down 18x18 that currently shows in Firefox 4) is simply horrible. I played with the thought of using "AB+" instead of "ABP" and putting the plus sign into background somehow but my graphical skills aren't enough to put that off.

Oh, and some of the supported applications use 32x32 icons (SeaMonkey Mail with Modern theme as well as Thunderbird on OS X) - a fact that I have been simply ignoring so far.
About the timing: when you say "we need it for Firefox 4", what does that mean in terms of the actual deadline? Is it something you can implement if you get it, say, one day before launch, or do you need it a few weeks before?
I'd like to give Wladimir (the developer of ABP) a chance to give his feedback on it and he'll probably need a couple days to update his add-on with the icon, so a few days before Firefox 4 would be okay.
The requirements are getting simpler - the plan is to drop one of the icon states for Adblock Plus 1.3.5 so that there will be only an "enabled" and a "disabled" state, the green icon is no longer necessary. Also, Tom Joseph tried to create new icons: http://adthwart.qux.us/proposed-icons.html (some users complained that the icons are too bright). I think that these icons are a good reference point - but small sizes definitely need some polishing.
I'll be working on some ideas this week.

Stay tuned!
Hey Sean...any updates?
Hey all,

Want to share an initial concept I worked on last week, sorry for the delay:

http://mozilla.seanmartell.com/adblock-plus-logo.png

- deeper red
- soft gradients, added depth
- 3 letter wordmark stands out well at all sizes

Wanted to get the basic style down before attempting the other states.

Let me know your thoughts.
Hey Wladimir, we're mainly looking for your feedback here, so please chime in. Thanks!
Attached image Contributed icons
Sorry, I was gathering feedback on my side. Personally, I like the new icons, particularly the fact that 16x16 icon is very clean. However, once piece of feedback that I got is that the color scheme feels "threatening". Also, people seem to like the set of icons better that we got from a user (attached) - while not as professional, it looks more fancy at larger sizes. Maybe you could combine the ideas somehow.
Sean, do you have time to improve the icons or is this as far as we get?
I'll answer for Sean since he's on a plane now.

Sean & I talked yesterday and this is definitely on his radar as something to do soon. He should comment on the exact timing, but I know he has thoughts about it and will be posting more in the near future. In other words, this isn't as far as you get!

Stay tuned for more...
- changed the text from sunken engraved to elevated white
- added white trim to v2 to bring it closer to current version
- two new versions attached, both keeping the clarity at the lower levels.
- the white border is nice but tends to become more visual noise at lower sizes
- to clarify the first version submitted, the sunken text was to mimic the style of icon glyphs used in the UI of current browsers.
Hi Wladimir, did you have comments on the latest iteration?
Not really - nobody seemed to like that version. In the end it was decided to go with the icons I attached above (these went through a few iterations as well). The icons have been updated in Adblock Plus 1.3.9, I simply forgot to update this bug.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 13 years ago
Resolution: --- → WONTFIX
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