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Someone working for the US Space Force must be a Trekkie. Star Trek fans say a new logo is a direct ripoff of Star Trek's Starfleet Command logo.
President Donald Trump revealed the new logo for the Space Force on Friday via Twitter.
[...]As soon as it was posted, eagle-eyed Star Trek fans responded, pointing out the logo's similarities to the Starfleet Command logo. The arrow, the swirl around the arrow, the star background and text placement are almost identical.
Cultural references and inspirations are only allowed for the right people?
Previously:
Space Force Offers First Peek at Camouflage Uniform
U.S. Space Force is Official
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Star Trek Fans are Not Pleased about the New US Space Force Logo
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(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 26 2020, @02:17AM (12 children)
The new logo is derived from an old Air Force logo that was specific to space operations. Trek probably got theirs from there, or perhaps it was just the obvious choice.
(Score: 3, Informative) by hemocyanin on Sunday January 26 2020, @02:35AM (11 children)
I was curious: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Force_Space_Command [wikipedia.org]
Space command was created in 1982. It isn't clear from Wikipedia if the logo was in use since then, but the new one is clearly an extension of the Space Command logo: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1220821545746141187 [twitter.com]
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Catalyst on Sunday January 26 2020, @03:20AM (10 children)
And the first time the Federation logo was seen was in DS9... I know, I was surprised too. So the Space Command logo was around before the Federation logo...
(Score: 5, Informative) by hemocyanin on Sunday January 26 2020, @07:09AM (9 children)
In order, based on the logos of DVD sets mainly:
TOS, 1966: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series_(season_1) [wikipedia.org]
USAF Space Command, 1982: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Force_Space_Command [wikipedia.org]
TNG, 1987: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation_(season_1) [wikipedia.org]
DS9, 1993: https://www.zavvi.com/dvd/star-trek-deep-space-nine-complete-re-package/11027499.html [zavvi.com]
Voyager, 1995: https://www.thetrekcollective.com/2011/06/ds9-dvd-collection.html [thetrekcollective.com] (same as DS9)
Enterprise, 2001: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_Enterprise_(season_1) [wikipedia.org] (this logo bears no relationship to any others)
USSF, 2019: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Space_Force [wikipedia.org]
As I see it, the only real connection is with the triangular shaped object and the time to bitch was back in 1982. The triangular shaped object is more airplane like in the US military logo and more abstract in the ST logo. With respect to the ST version of this triangle, I think it looks more like a 50s inspired rocket with a bit of 60s LSD warping. The USAF version is very clean cut, and sort of Stealth like and it appears that the first Stealth Bomber flew in 1981, so that sort of makes sense. The USAF version also looks like a star with two points cut off, which makes sense in some ways but is sort of bad imagery -- like a plane with wings cut off.
The Star Trek logo clearly had its own evolution up to ST Enterprise --- did anyone ever watch that? I hated the couple episodes I saw --- where it completely departed from tradition. By the same token, the USAF has been using the logo with the triangular object in the center for almost 40 years and the USSF logo is a clear evolution of that decades old concept.
So as I said, the time for outrage over the triangular shape in the middle is over. As for the satellite swirl around the globe, it seems that did not appear on the ST logo until after the Space Command logo was old news. If the USAF wanted to bitch about that borrowing by ST, the time for that rage passed in the early 90s.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Sunday January 26 2020, @07:13AM (4 children)
Darn it, forgot the link for the Stealth bomber: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_F-117_Nighthawk [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Sunday January 26 2020, @07:14AM (3 children)
double dern it -- I guess it's not a bomber.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 26 2020, @03:56PM (2 children)
Were you looking for the Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit [wikipedia.org]?
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Sunday January 26 2020, @05:35PM (1 child)
No, the Nighthawk which is described as "ground attack" airplane, but I'm not a military plane geek so I inaccurately called it a "bomber" -- that was the later B2 which flew in 1989 (according to Wikipedia) so it would not have been relevant to the Space Command Logo, at least presumably.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 26 2020, @09:21PM
Your military plane non-geek status did not cause an inaccuracy.
The F-117 Stealth Fighter was named/designated to deliberately cause confusion as to what it really was: a stealthy precision bomber that could slip in unnoticed, execute a precise bombing mission, and return to base, all while hopefully remaining untargetable.
Ground attack craft are a subset of bombers. They started as fighters mounting bombs/rockets, then dedicated dive bombers were developed, and so on.
So quit beating yourself up, technically you were correct in calling it a bomber, it is.
*sigh* Yet another of the multitude of evils done by marketing...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by EvilSS on Sunday January 26 2020, @06:04PM
Actually the flying delta dates back to WWII Army Air Corps and has been used on USAF emblems and insignias ever since. USAF doesn't usually allow real aircraft to be used on insignias so they use the delta. The comet swoop and constellations (take a close look, the two on the space force patch are a direct match) are from the original NASA logo. Both pre-date TOS. Also a certain Star Trek creator was a US Army Air Corp pilot in WWII and a NASA space flight fan...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Reziac on Monday January 27 2020, @02:46AM (2 children)
Hated the first few I saw of Enterprise, but then stumbled onto some later ones and damn, this got good while I wasn't looking. So binged the whole thing (it's really all One Big Story) and while it's got plenty of weak and sloppy points, overall it's quite good, with some fine character arcs. And it holds up to rewatching. (Rather better than Lost In Trek, er, I mean Voyager, which I never really liked and only watched for lack of alternative entertainment.) Yeah, I suppose it busts canon here and there, but not to the point that I had no idea which universe I'd fell into, like some later incarnations we could bitch about.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by Catalyst on Monday January 27 2020, @08:55PM (1 child)
It started slow and ended too early, but was good overall.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Monday January 27 2020, @09:52PM
Yep, pretty good way to describe it. Really needed one more season to finish out the story, rather than the rushed clip-show ending (which the producers later acknowledged was well-meant but a mistake). But overall? heck of a good story.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.