iTunes and its Icon/Logo

iTunes 10 was just released this Wednesday. Among its many changes was a change to the icon. At first, I was unsure and hesitant about the new icon. It seems to violate the look of the other apps in the dock, and also what is stated in the Human Interface Guidelines. It lacks that “on the desktop” look present in icons such as iCal, Preview, Mail, Safari, and even the old iTunes icon. Then I read the Viewer, Player, and Accessory Icons section in the Guidelines, particularly the following sentence:

Some applications that represent objects or well known products, such as Calculator and QuickTime Player, are most easily recognized by the symbols or objects themselves. 

I’ve bolded the part that particularly struck me. I realized what I think is the actual reason for the change. iTunes is no longer just software that needs an icon, as it once was. It is now an entire service that also requires a logo (this article points out the difference between icons and logos). As iTunes continues growing, it needs a quickly recognizable logo that identifies it. A simple music note placed inside a circle. The previous icon hardly did the job. It was simply too complex. And it could not be scaled up or down to a large degree, and still be recognizable.

With that, I don’t think Steve Jobs gave the complete reason for the change. iTunes didn’t have to remove the CD from its icon because it is making the CD, as a means for owning music, obsolete. If that was the case, by the same argument, Pages would have to remove the ink well from its icon, and Preview would have to remove the Paper photograph from its icon. Technology has essentially made both obsolete. However, I think there is some truth to what Jobs stated. iTunes has become so large and popular that it has overtaken the sales of CDs. The service needs an instantly recognizable, and simple symbol that people can quickly identify with the services provided by it. It is no longer just software, it is an entire ecosystem of services.

The example Apple provided in the Guidelines applies to this as well. Quicktime is quickly identified by the “Q” logo, and that can effectively serve as its icon. For example, the Quicktime icon can be simply identified with the simple black and white logo. In the same way, the new iTunes icon can quickly serve as a simple and identifiable logo for its service. I lack the skills to make a similar black and white logo for iTunes, but you can visualize what it may look like by taking out the background of the current icon. iTunes will soon be only recognized by this logo, and that is why it also serves as the new icon.

Of course, I could be completely wrong, and the people at Apple simply wanted to change iTunes’ aging icon to something completely new.