Signs, signs, and more signs
New York City lends to an interesting study of signs. There’s a sign for everything, pretty much everywhere. Some are boring. Some are great. Some are funny. Some are chic. And some are just perplexing. I’ll be covering the latter in this post.
The Goal: Hey you driver! There’s a new Stop sign. Take notice. You should stop at it. For real.
The Problem: It’s hard to imagine someone is going to notice the Stop sign ONLY because there is a small yellow “NEW” sign beneath it. Presumably, you’d see the much larger Stop sign before the smaller New sign below it. The logic is faulty here. Seems like an exercise in futility to me.
A Solution: One solution could be to change the color of the Stop sign itself. For example, new Stop signs could be an obnoxiously bright shade of orangish red. But I think a color change could be dangerous to something as important and fundamental as a Stop sign. Instead, I would advocate some bright flashing lights outlining the sign. If you really want people to see a sign, why not highlight its outline with something they HAVE to notice?
The Goal: You got legal problems? Well, we got legal services. All of them. Literally.
The Problem: Clutter. Color. Font face. Everything.
A Solution: Besides the obvious color issue (seriously Mr. Ciafone, Esq., let’s stick to 3 colors max — you get to choose red/yellow/black or American colors, but NOT both), this sign would be much clearer if it limited the information. Mr. Ciafone, we get that you will take on all cases; your sign could portray that information much more concisely. What would be nice is to have a stronger value add statement and an even stronger call to action.
The Goal: Hello there, subway traveler. Oh, you’re about to come down these stairs? Well, you’re in luck if it’s non rush hours. Otherwise, DON’T YOU FREAKING DARE.
The Problem: The sign doesn’t take into account how people actually behave. No one cares about what the sign says. If there are people coming up that side of the stairs, then people won’t come down. And vice versa.
A Solution: If you really want to direct people when they can and cannot go down these stairs, how about a simple light system: green checkmark when it’s OK, and red “do not enter” mark when it’s not OK. This stuff is easy. We learned how to make something like that in our first week of physical computing. COME ON MTA!
The Goal: (said in a deep Barry White style voice) Why hello again sexy subway rider. You know, nothing exciting ever happens by staying home. You should come out and do something exciting, presumably at our proprietorship.
The Problem: I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT SAID PROPRIETORSHIP IS!?! It’s just a weird logo with “CH” and some needle and thread icon (I think?). Sorry CH, you’re not on that level yet. But I will try to go out. Just probably not to your place.
A Solution: A real logo or name would be cool. Maybe even a website or something? I want to come out and create a great story of my own, but you gotta give me more info CH!