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Network World favicon a bit too familiar?

I ran into Network World a while ago linked from some article I was reading and was taken by the site’s favicon. It’s almost a direct copy of del.icio.us’s:

Favicons of del.icio.us and Network World

The colors and layout are all but identical. The only difference is the orientation of the black and blue portions. I can’t decide whether or not it’s possible that it’s a coincidence.

A part of me wonders if it’s even post-worthy. Favicons serve a distinct purpose in making sites more recognizable and it seems someone designing a tech-oriented site (with a digg widget on the front page) would know about del.icio.us.

Is it reasonable to speculate on favicon plagiarism?

Jonathan Bailey said,

March 18, 2008 @ 6:30 am

I hate to say it, but I don’t really see it in this case. Yes, the colors are very close (the NW one does not have the gray) and there is some similarity in orientation, but a favicon leaves very little room for creativity. If NW had been using those colors on their own, which appears to be the case, I suspect they just did what they could with their Favicon and didn’t even expect it to mirror any one else.

I’m sure there are dozens of Favicons similar to my own that I don’t even know about. I just did it because it matched my logo.

I’m the first to jump on anyone for plagiarism, but when it comes to favicons, there is a strong likelihood of independent discovery. It’s just such a small palette.

Evan said,

March 18, 2008 @ 10:54 am

I hear what you’re saying, Jonathon. I’m not trying to play judge and executioner, so I hope I’m no coming off as such. It’s such a small scale that it’s not worth getting into a huge fuss over. It’s just interesting to think about, at least in terms of the challenge of coming up with original content on such a tiny canvas.

Jonathan Bailey said,

March 18, 2008 @ 12:03 pm

It didn’t come across that way at all. However, I think we may be nearing the bottom of all visual creativity.

http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?object_id=80385

Evan said,

March 18, 2008 @ 12:46 pm

I’m all for simplicity, but that’s ridiculous. There’s a stack of 50 copies of that in my printer. Imagine if this Malevich guy got overzealous with forgery lawsuits?

Modern art can be weird. :P

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