The popular BlackBerry messaging app, BBM, is just a few months old on the iOS platform and has so far added several million more users into the BBM fold. All this buzz around the app has sparked a lot of interest in the Apple community, and one designer has come up with his own take on a BBM icon to better fit the flat design of iOS 7. As it sits, the current BBM icon for iOS 7 resembles the old skeumorphic style of previous iOS operating systems.
The designer behind the new take goes by the alias Digital Homeboy, and is well known for his BlackBerry device concept designs. Digital Homeboy breaks down the reasons for us why he thinks his take should be adopted as the new official icon for BBM on iOS 7:
“My BBM icon take is a play on simplicity to the core. The elimination of featured gloss and black gradient in the middle to the thick grey stroke outline. I have also decided to remove the reversed fore fronted chat bubble as users new and old are or have become quite familiar on the abbreviated three letters. The singular shape and minor adjusted tweaks are actually taken from the Legacy BlackBerry models where a tiny BBM icon would show up in the notifications bar which has also carried over to Android in a less friendlier way. The original iOS 7 BBM icon when compared to the other big and small developer apps, who have as well updated their icons to be more reflective and keep the continuity flow of iOS 7, makes this BBM icon stand out as a sore thumb but only being saved slightly by its gradient backing.”
As you can see in the icon comparison image, the current BBM icon already varies slightly from platform to platform, so it would make sense for BlackBerry to update the icon to match the flat iOS 7 design to fit in better with its native environment.
Tweet this article to @BBM if you think BlackBerry should adopt Digital Homeboy’s BBM icon design for iOS 7.
