back to article Nokia launches new corporate font

Nokia hasn't got much in the way of exciting and desirable new phones to show you - alas, the old management really buggered things up. The first Windows Phone won't be here until 2012. But here's the next best thing: a new corporate font will be unveiled in trendy Hoxton, the spiritual home of the web2.0 mediaslut. The font …

COMMENTS

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  1. Test Man

    Thank God

    Their current font is an abomination.

  2. Chemist

    Too much ..

    time on their hands.

    Too much money. Er, no,wait...

    1. Lars Silver badge
      Pint

      @Chemist

      No, the "problem" is probably, that this font project was started several years ago and has now

      reached this happy ending.

      I will use a Nokia, "to the bitter end", but never buy a MS Nokia.

  3. The Alpha Klutz

    Some people might see the 's' representing the curves of the female body?

    yeah, sex offenders.

    It just looks like Helvetica.

    "inspired by the new typography"

    This font inspires me to dump a load.

    1. The Alpha Klutz

      personally

      I think that the 'h' represents human misery.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Funstional?

      "We wanted to give it a natural, flowing form, while creating something that is highly functional and neutral". About as neutral and functional as, say, ice cubes, toast, cardboard, the colour grey, air and a whole lot of other utterly boring but useful things.

  4. Dodgy Pilot
    FAIL

    Errr... ?

    It's not April 1st already is it ?

  5. Captain Scarlet Silver badge
    Boffin

    Nokia to shout about everything then?

    Only cap locks will be used from now on by NOKIA.

    I better raise my spit shield

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    errr

    errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ~~~~~~ o.O

    That is all.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    Follow the white line...

    ...to the exhibition, people!

  8. Wind Farmer

    One for the Irish?

    Love what runs down from the top right corner (that of Seamus and you'll get it).

    1. SimonX
      Happy

      Fear of flying?

      I think it's an Erica Jong thing.

  9. Steve Evans

    Oh ffs!

    Honestly Nokia, that's going to make so much difference isn't it! Surely you have better things to focus on?

    Guess it will look nice on the corporate grave stone.

  10. Figgus

    Fontzi

    [i]"Some might see the 's' representing the curves the female body, while some might see it as a skirt, just like Marilyn [Monroe]'s", muses one artist.[/i]

    Or we might see it as just another crappy font with no meaning whatsoever since we are artsy-fartsy turds.

    Or, even more likely, most of us will never buy another Nokia with Win7 and thus will NEVER see the font at all.

    1. Steve J. Rapaport
      Happy

      Laughing out loud

      Some might see it as a really plain-looking capital S.

  11. SkippyBing

    Errr..

    Has someone just sold them Arial Bold?

  12. Jolyon

    Wordsearch

    Feel connected, fluid inclusive . . . . MERK

    1. Steve Evans

      re: Wordsearch

      Yes, I just saw that too...

      Nasty!

  13. JB
    Happy

    Title

    A prime candidate for Private Eye's Pseud's Corner column!

  14. Charlie Clark Silver badge
    WTF?

    Check the date

    Is 24th March some kind of early April fool in Finland? Love the wordsearch, so very Nathan Barley.

    So Nokia drops a distinctive if polarising typeface for another Helvetica look-a-like? Come to our art exhibition and celebrate with us as we burn our brand on a funeral pyre of old logo carved from Finnish pine.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So

    Is this the nokia-only wp7 content then?

  16. The Cube

    Waffle waffle bullshit bollocks

    Utters one pointless tosspot who has spent far too long climbing inside his own sphincter...

  17. G2
    Grenade

    graphic evolution

    on the contrary, i see that alphabet soup picture as a forewarning of nokia's impending demise:

    if you look at those three white lines that they used, i think that they are a condensed expression (and admission at the same time) of the entire company evolution: rise to glory, stagnation and then finally, crash and burn (i.e. bankruptcy or irrelevance in the market)

  18. JDX Gold badge

    Well it's OK but...

    just looks like a normal font to me. And is it all-caps?

  19. h 6
    Boffin

    Font?

    It's a *typeface*, not a font. (A font is software.)

  20. schnide
    Unhappy

    As someone who lives near the area..

    ..I can confirm that this is the perfect place to launch some trendy, meaningless bullshit. Hipsters of the world - unite!

  21. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Huh?

    - "as little design as possible...made to celebrate human creativity."

    - Aapo Bovellan

    Two oxy-morons for the price of one?

  22. Dazzz
    FAIL

    Doh!

    Why werent these media slut jokers first up against the wall when elop signed up to the windows phone revolution?

    Honestly they could save a fortune getting rid of most of the new media crap they put out.

  23. IR

    Meh

    I can't be the only person who spent a few minutes looking for any unintentional words in that wordsearch, despite knowing that a thousand marketing guys have already done so. I was surprised to see CHROME though, working with Google? Seems out of place it they are just refering to the browser. And who are Alfy, Ray, Fred, and Tim?

    Pretty generic font though, like a thousand others. No much point in branding if it is so indistinguishable.

  24. Tom Maddox Silver badge
    FAIL

    Well, I'm convinced!

    There's some decisive action! I wasn't considering buying a Nokia handset, but this new font really has caught my eye!

    There's a special pomposity about font designers, probably a result of someone being forced to care much about something so small and irrelevant (insert dick joke here).

  25. Doug Glass
    Go

    My 4yo grandkid ...

    ... is a font and typeface genius. She makes new and earth shattering examples every day in multiple colors and in various media: crayons, finger painting, Etch-A-Sketch and etc. For that matter, so did Jethro Bodine in his sign shop. This is really IT news of the highest order.

  26. Giles Jones Gold badge

    Products?

    Isn't this the wrong problem with such companies? they spend too much time on brands, type faces, logos and so on. Nokia even had their own ringtone tune.

    How about spending a little more time on the product?

    1. Windrose

      Whining.

      Ask all those people - tech bloggers in particular - who has been whining for years about how TERRIBLE, just TERRIBLE the "Nokia font" is. World will perish. Kittens will be without cuddles. Universe will freeze over. And so on and so forth.

      Now Nokia is going down the fluffy road to satisfy that lot. Well done, says I. Of course, it'd be better if they ignored the whiners (and Endgadget, and The Register, AND Elop) and kept doing what they do best: Symbian (and Maemo).

      Counting down to the mandatory bitching about Symbian in 3 ... 2 ...

  27. Eeep !
    Thumb Down

    Products people want - that's what's needed !

    How does a company that has products that aren't attractive to users because they don't have the features that reviewers, and users want, think that a type face change will make a difference to their bottom line ?

    I'd use whatever the type face was when products sold at their height (simple way to get familiarity/nostalgia) and put it on phones that people reviews liked and users wanted to buy.

    Paying someone to mess with brand recognition when you don't have anything that will be positively associated with the new visual version of the brand seems dodgy thinking.

    But who am I to ask, I don't run a mobile phone making business :( Have never owned a Nokia either :)

    1. Windrose
      Thumb Down

      Sorry to disagree.

      "How does a company that has products that aren't attractive to users because they don't have the features that reviewers, and users want ... "

      Sorry to disagree, old chap, but you got that half wrong. From the sales numbers USERS want Nokia. Loads and loads and loads of Nokia. Reviewers don't, but then again they are in general too busy cuddling their [insert favourite toy here] .

      Why Nokia listen to them and not their users ... I got no idea. Just wish they'd stop dicker, and release a N9[50] along the lines of the E7. And replace Elop.

  28. Dan 55 Silver badge
    Unhappy

    "Right, that's the font screwed up at great expense"

    "What's next on the list?"

    And I thought Nokia was like Titanic before the Microsoft announcement. It just keeps getting worse.

  29. Ilgaz

    Not tolling

    actually, the display font of vista+ is really good. As it comes from Microsoft, they ordered it in a way that it will only work/display fine with cleartype so forget the idea of exporting it.

    Ms culture shows itself even on a font of course.

  30. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    you didn't consider the licensing

    If they license it to Microsoft, they can get $1 for every Windows installation....instant success.

    And if they license the lowercase set they can make $2...

    And if they add symbols and punctuation they can make $3...

    I do have one question, though: Are they going to stop advertising in Russia, Japan, China, Egypt (and any other country that doesn't use this character set?

    1. Kristian Walsh Silver badge

      To answer your question:

      No, it looks like a pretty big font, supporting at least Latin, Cyrillic, Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Thai and Devanagari, judging by the designers' homepage:

      http://www.daltonmaag.com/news/177.html

  31. Kristian Walsh Silver badge
    Badgers

    Nice typeface, shame about the launch

    This isn't an all-caps face, it has a full repertoire.

    One recurring criticism of Symbian was it's default font, Series60 Sans. Americans particularly do not like it, but then Americans prefer wider typefaces anyway (and English doesn't use long words that would require a more condensed face). I actually like this face for menu use, but it's not ideal for setting large amounts of text (web pages?).

    The guy from Nokia was describing the face quite accurately, by the way, with very little waffle. Every trade has its own way of using the language. As a programmer who also does a bit of graphic design, let me translate for you:

    "a natural, flowing form" <-- "natural" means that the curves are not simple geometric shapes, and are more like the curves found in natural objects than machine-drawn - the letter curves appear to be based on a superellipse, that staple of Scandinavian* design. "Flowing" means that the curves of one letter lead easily into those of the adjacent one.

    "highly functional and neutral," <-- "neutral" means the typeface is suitable for use in a wide range of applications, without adding or distorting the message it's used to write. Helvetica is neutral, Times less so, but think of setting a technical spec in something like Zapfino, to see how a font can colour a message.

    "Nokia Pure has a clarity of purpose" <-- This is waffle, but "clarity" is true. It looks like a nice, clear face.

    "as little design as possible" <- there are no quirky characters like Helvetica's odd R, or Palatino's unclosed P that look "designed". All fonts are designed, meticulously. A good font is like a good referee, you don't notice it, but you know it's there.

    "It’s made to celebrate human creativity." <- waffle.

    The DesignWeek article that Andrew O lifted from has a couple more samples, for the typographically inclined. Overall, it's a silly launch for a nice typeface, but as it won't go on sale (it's a commission for Nokia, who will use it exclusively), the point is probably moot.

    * and I know Finland isn't in Scandinavia.

    1. Ilgaz

      sad thing

      Let me also add that Symbian font can be changed, for years. A basic file copy can work but there are more mature/safe ways.

      Monotype guys also came up with an excellent idea to make money with it and released flipfont. I use it right now with the excellent Felbridge font on my E71.

      Sad part is, this will never happen with windows phone, perhaps with some hacks it will happen but I hate the idea of hacking a mobile device.

      Some people may be thinking why Nokia users (not reviewers) like Symbian, it is one of the several reasons.

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    This guy should lunach a career in stand up comedy

    "Nokia Pure has a clarity of purpose"

    As opposed to Nokia's lack of purpose lately.

    "and as little design as possible"

    Exactly like Nokia who's not designing any new phone.

    "It’s made to celebrate human creativity."

    As opposed to Nokia's creativity.

    I think this sentence is either:

    1) Incredibly smart in its sarcasm.

    2) Incredibly out of touch with the situtation Nokia is currently in.

    Can't wait for their next exhibition:

    Consumer: So, did you guys get your act together?

    Nokia rep (excited): YES! Yes we definitely do!

    Consumer: Great, show me this new phone.

    Nokia rep: Well, not quite as much as a phone... or maybe even better... wait for it.... (hysterical) A NEW FONT!

    Consumer: Are you effing kidding me?

  33. TheOtherHobbbes
    Megaphone

    Logo management!

    Ash: "I admire its purity."

    Alien by Ridley Scott, 1979

  34. Richie 1

    Ass kissing

    I notice that ELOP is one of the words in the wordsearch. (Near the top left corner, in a north west direction.)

    1. Steve J. Rapaport

      ELOP

      no you are reading it backwards, it's POLE.

  35. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    talk about

    killer app -

    must

    sell

    iphone

    NOW!

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re-Invet the wheel

    Once again Nokia has shot its self in the foot, 200,000 existing fonts to choose from and they had to design another????

    I hear they are about to layoff thousands of staff and then they spend millions on a new font, because customers will choose a phone because the font likes nice,

    WAKE UP NOKIA SMELL THE COFFEE

    1. Ilgaz

      Clones, devices

      There are reasons for companies coming up with their own designer font. Without getting into devices, let me tell the most basic one.

      You "own" your font, you don't license it so the evil clone device maker (nokia's worst problem) will get into a more serious risk copying it. So they will never be able to perfectly copy your experience.

      Speaking of clone guys, they must be partying after windows phone decision, they can basically license it from MS for stuff like "E777" models ;)

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hidden meaning

    Were DOUR and DIRT included deliberately?

    1. fch
      Linux

      reverse logic ...

      ... always play the record backwards - good spotting.

      I've found "CHROME" and "INCLUSIVE" in there, not even in reverse diagonals - maybe there'll be some better news from Nokia soon.

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'd love to be

    in Elop's office when the press cuttings including this little reminder of the good old days arrive on his desk.

    What's the corporate equivalent of a Tomahawk cruise missile?

  39. fch
    Pint

    Thanks god it's Friday !

    ... that's probably why the last lines in the puzzle have it:

    "FLUID INCLUSIVE".

    There we go - nice weekend everyone !

  40. briesmith
    Stop

    BabbleFishkii

    I would like to comment on the contents of the graphic in this article but I don't speak Finnish. If a translation could be provided I'll wow you all with my thoughts.

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/Design/graphics/icons/comment/stop_32.png http://www.theregister.co.uk/Design/graphics/icons/comment/go_32.png http://www.theregister.co.uk/Design/graphics/icons/comment/wtf_32.png

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: BabbleFishkii

      Not before you've stopped dragging icons into the text box you won't!

  41. cloudberry

    at least the third Nokia font

    This is already the third corporate font that Nokia has introduced in the past ten years or so.

    I worked for Nokia in 1998 to 2006, and remember font number 2, "Nokia Sans", being launched just a couple of years after font number 1, whose name I forget. I've often seen font #1 being used in displays, advertisements, etc., that have nothing to do with Nokia. So, I wonder if Nokia made a mistake with registering the intellectual property for #1, somehow letting it escape to the public domain, or at least failing to buy it exclusively for their own use. I don't see font #3, "Nokia Pure", being obviously superior to #1, even though Pure also looks quite nice, in my humble opinion.

    Anyway, to all those complaining about how Nokia should focus on other things: it is one of the world's top consumer electronics companies, with over a billion customers. Good industrial design -- and to a lesser extent, a consistent corporate image -- are pretty important when competing in the consumer electronics market.

    So, one can debate the merits of the particular font, or the need to change the corporate font so frequently, but it's a bit silly to imply that it's a waste of resources for Nokia to pay attention to their main corporate font. It's not like the rest of the company's over 130,000 employees were waiting on the font decision.

    By the way, the wide font used in the NOKIA workmark is Eurostile Bold Extended: http://www.fontshop.com/search/?q=eurostile+bold+extended+. The wordmark is at least some decades old.

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