Thanks for posting these up, Paul. Very nice! I guess this reminded me of the thread we never had: can/should we use these on books?
My gut reaction is "no". We should only use them on flyers and bookmarks promoting the site and community rather than as a brand on a book.
Anyone want to take up the side of putting them on books?
I'll do my best to post my
Submitted by Andrew Kenrick on Mon, 16/07/2007 - 21:55.
I'll do my best to post my long-talked about thread about branding tomorrow, and we can discuss it more there!
If we are helping promote
Submitted by Iain McAllister on Tue, 17/07/2007 - 08:49.
If we are helping promote each others games and a given game we are printing has been designed with the help of the collective, then I would see it as a positive thing to use the logo. Maybe even add a small bit of blab in the back under thanks.
Again this would be to bloster the community rather than having a CE imprint.
Cheers
Iain
Lead Developer Mob Justice RPG
'The Giant Brain' has launched.
Hi Iain
Submitted by Gregor Hutton on Tue, 17/07/2007 - 10:23.
Cool, but let's take it to Andrew's thread once he's posted it. And we can leave this thread for the logos themselves (and very nice they are too).
I think they would look nice on metal pin badges, I'll see if I can find the website my friend Preston uses.
Hah, through the magic of
Submitted by Matt on Tue, 17/07/2007 - 11:24.
Hah, through the magic of the graft-system this thread is now its own thing.
-Matt
Realms Publishing
Thanks!
Submitted by Gregor Hutton on Tue, 17/07/2007 - 19:16.
OK, to play devil's advocate... since anyone that comes here can consider themselves a member, I would think that everyone is perfectly entitled to put the badge on their books. (This ain't a clique, right? There is no one controlling who is or isn't here.). What if they haven't developed their game here as much as the other members would like? Or the game is offensive? Or just not very good?
Does that devalue the badge on other people's books? Or maybe it's just a badge, right?
Convince me. :-)
[As an aside: I wondered about putting a logo on the latest printing of Best Friends... but in the end I just put "Discuss this and other UK independent games: collective-endeavour.com" on it.]
I err on the no-logos point of view.
Submitted by Matt on Tue, 17/07/2007 - 19:55.
Sure this is a nice central place, but it's here to facilitate, not be a stamp of approval or merit.
I totally support folks adding a brief note in the frontmatter of a book to the effect of : produced with help from the Collective Endeavour.
If they feel we have been of help, that is.
-Matt
Realms Publishing
For all our independence,
Submitted by Andrew Kenrick on Wed, 18/07/2007 - 08:25.
For all our independence, we're all selling under the same banner, from the same stall, and I suspect in many customer's eyes we are a single entity.
I'm not proposing branding our books with a "Collective Endeavour seal of approval", but I am saying that like it or not, by participating in the CE at conventions we are branded to a certain degree.
One thing we agreed at Games Expo was that every game we currently have on the stall is one we all happily believe in and are confident in the knowledge that when we sell it to someone it is a good product.
As we proceed as a Collective, I want to continue to be able to look customers in the eye and sell them a book that I believe in.
So how do we go about doing this? How do we make sure that every single book on our stall is a good, solid buy? After all, if we sell crap, it reflects badly on us all.
I think there are two issues
Submitted by Malcolm Craig on Wed, 18/07/2007 - 08:34.
I think there are two issues here (one of placing a logo on books and another of quality presented by the Collective Endeavour). I'm going to address the first one.
The Collective Endeavour is a not a brand. Not yet at any rate. Putting the logo on a book is pointless at the moment, as it serves no purpose other than to present the name of the Collective Endeavour to those who might not have heard of it.
In many ways, that serves a purpose in getting the CE name out there. However, we should not be under the impression that the CE represents a marketable brand in terms of a logo and name, at the moment.
So, putting the logo on books is probably not something we want to do at the moment. There is no 'brand identity', there is no 'seal of quality'. Not at the moment. Those are things we must work very, very hard to attain. This kind of thing does not spring into being over night, they have to be worked at over a lengthy period of time.
Looking at a point where we do put the logo on books, one thing:
It should never, ever be larger than the logo of your own imprint. Yes, we are a collectve but we should all strive to retain our independence of thought and action. The moment where having the CE logo on your book is more important than your own brand is the point where we have ceased to be a collective, working to help each other, and have become a brand entity that we might as well all become part of, rather than numerous smaller publishers.
That's my thoughts on it anyway.
Cheers
Malcolm
Contested Ground Studios