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If haven't already noticed, we recently launched a new icon, one that accompanies our standard corporate logo on just about anything ScoringLive across the interwebs.

For those that have paid attention to the icon we've deployed over the years, it has always been a variant of the letters S and L, but as you've probably noticed, the 2018 version is a clear departure from that.

So I wanted to take this opportunity to go back and look at all of the ScoringLive icons from 2009 to now, and provide a little bit of commentary on each. Hope you find this walk down memory lane at least somewhat interesting.

The OG icon - 2009

When ScoringLive first opened up shop, our main logo used a very letterman jacket-like font called Varsity for the Scoring part of ScoringLive. Basically, the icon followed the same formula, an S and L in that same font. Not very sexy, but it was what it was.

Script icon - 2010

The SL script icon rolled out sometime in late 2010, and was featured on as a back graphic on the first ScoringLive shirts worn by our staff. The concept was patterned after the stylized alphabetic logos you might see on a baseball cap.

SL icon v.1 - 2011

SL icon version one was launched in conjuction with the second (and current) ScoringLive main logo at the start of the 2011 sports year. Conceptually, the icon was simply a compacted version of the ScoringLive logo, consisting of the S in Scoring and an L in the same font style, slightly enlongated for balance.

SL icon v.2 - 2015

The second version of the SL icon was introduced in mid-2015. The idea behind it was to further compact and integrate the S and the L into a single icon.

SL icon v.3 - 2016

Version three of the SL icon, introduced in August of 2016, was a revisit of what was used in version one, but a rounder L was put in place of the more angled L and the S was also elongated slightly over the original.

SL icon v.4 - 2018

The present version of the SL icon appears to be neither an S or an L at first glance, but that isn't entirely true. Initial mockups of the icon were actually turned 90 degrees counter-clockwise, as the icon itself was first meant to be a negative space S.

What's more, the negative space 'remnants' that make up the icon are actually distilled, at least in part, from the S portion of SL icon v.2.

As for what the icon is supposed to mean, it really doesn't have any specific idea to convey. For me, I see the icon as a kind of inverse refresh button and a very stylized version of a plus symbol, which I think is symbolic of what we do with scores and stats we enter.

Staying power?

I honestly think that this current iteration of our icon has the potential to stick around for a good long while, much like the current ScoringLive main logo that I think just about every regular visitor of our site instantly recognizes, even from a distance.

Only time will tell, of course, but that's the hope.

Timing-wise, it comes at kind of a similar moment as when we changed the main logo at the start of the 2011 sports year. Beyond the aesthetic improvement (at least to me) the new ScoringLive logo brought, it came at a moment when we experienced quite the paradigm shift organizationally, with some pretty radical growth in not only viewership but also expansion in content.

And that's kind of where we are now, again.

When we look back in say five years (God-willing still doing what we are now!), my hope is that the roll-out of SL icon v.4 will be seen historically as coming at a time that marked another large paradigm shift for ScoringLive.

There are some new directions and interesting developments we have in the works, and I for one am excited for what is to come.