?You couldn’t take a picture of Enron’s crime: it all happened in the world of numbers and spreadsheets, of financial reports and affidavits. But there was something you could take a picture of, and that was Rand’s logo. A company with a made-up name, incomprehensible business practices, and largely intangible assets suddenly had a vivid manifestation, a logo that once might have stood for nimbleness, balance and connectivity, now given new life as “the crooked E.”

Much of this essay covers the role of Paul Rand in the design of this iconic representation of a company that crumbled to the ground, and just what, if any, responsibility a designer might have in legitimizing the actions of the company by providing such a successfully digestible logo.

What seems significant here is that Michael is making quite clear here that the logo for an entity takes on much more than just the responsibility of a logo. Perhaps the entire weight of a company, and what they do right…and wrong…may be on the shoulders of this mark. Also in Michael?s post, he points to Naomi Klein’s No Logo which points out ??they make firms accountable to consumers.?

Read more here >
The Smartest Logo in the Room
http://www.designobserver.com/archives/030468.html