And it's worth adding that both of these proposed design options are great work in isolation; separate from any existing market concerns, these would make for great logo systems.
But the biggest problem for any redesign is that the current Firefox globe is just so damn good. It has been refined numerous times over the past decade but iconographically—when viewed at a small size for short bursts of time—it has barely changed since the original in 2003. Each refinement has simplified the design to a point where further simplification is simply not justifiable for reasons of aesthetics or utility.
Look at the progressive simplification of the QANTAS flying kangaroo logo over the years. [0] The third-most recent logo is utterly iconic and timeless. The second-most recent iteration teetered on the edge of a cliff of oversimplification and gave the kangaroo clown feet. The current logo? The only reason that it isn't an obvious trainwreck, the only reason isn't immediately obvious that they've fallen off the cliff is because it evokes memories of the older logos when the kangaroo actually looked like a kangaroo. They've doubled down on the clown feet and given it a gradient that makes zero sense. The overall shape is so abstract that it might as well be a boomerang-like throwing or slicing implement. But it does look super modern.
And it's worth adding that both of these proposed design options are great work in isolation; separate from any existing market concerns, these would make for great logo systems.
But the biggest problem for any redesign is that the current Firefox globe is just so damn good. It has been refined numerous times over the past decade but iconographically—when viewed at a small size for short bursts of time—it has barely changed since the original in 2003. Each refinement has simplified the design to a point where further simplification is simply not justifiable for reasons of aesthetics or utility.
Look at the progressive simplification of the QANTAS flying kangaroo logo over the years. [0] The third-most recent logo is utterly iconic and timeless. The second-most recent iteration teetered on the edge of a cliff of oversimplification and gave the kangaroo clown feet. The current logo? The only reason that it isn't an obvious trainwreck, the only reason isn't immediately obvious that they've fallen off the cliff is because it evokes memories of the older logos when the kangaroo actually looked like a kangaroo. They've doubled down on the clown feet and given it a gradient that makes zero sense. The overall shape is so abstract that it might as well be a boomerang-like throwing or slicing implement. But it does look super modern.
[0] http://mascola.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/line-up-1200x8...