Create a stunning logo for Leaf, our new social tool!

Leaf

Hello designers, this is Paul from Leaf. We are in the process of launching a new social tool aimed at removing the communication "white noise" that too many emails and phone calls create - so that our users always have timely, correct info for the things they care about most.

This is a bold idea; we ALL suffer from email overload and there are about 1,000,000 companies out there that claim solutions to the problem. What makes Leaf different is that we allow the USER to decide what is important to them and how they get updates, rather than some anonymous filter in a box somewhere.

We are trying to quite literally change the world, by making sure everyone has the right information, at the right time, at the right place. You can be a part of our extended team by submitted a logo design that embodies our revolutionary attitude: we are calm, in control, put the customer first, and absolutely will not stop until everyone with an Internet connection has the information they need to make good decisions about the things they care about.

We can't wait to see what you come up with.

Our target customers are people who create and consume huge amounts of information, such as emails. Product managers, project managers, sales people, executives, politicians, lawyers - anyone that is suffering from overload. They've been promised for years by company after company that they've solve the problem with better spam filters, better email programs, or better training. None of it has worked, and with new services like Twitter and Facebook the problem is only getting worse. These busy people need a solution yesterday - because they are making decisions based on out-of-date or even incorrect data, and we're not going to stand for it.

Leaf needs to appeal to a broad cross section of users and buyers. Our initial target is technology product managers and project managers. As we ramp, our service will be used by high functioning, Internet savvy users such as yourself to manage the critical information in their lives.

Thanks for designing Leaf's future logo. You're going to go down in history.

Our logo needs to meet all of the normal requirements:
* Classic, timeless
* Simple and distinctive (does it look like other logos that are in the market)
* Logo part stands on its own and is recognizable
* Inspires confidence
* Work in print and online
* Can it scale down to icon size (32x32) and still be recognizable?
* Practical and non-offensive (duh)

In addition, we would like to see logos that have these qualities:
* As our company name is Leaf, it would make sense for our logo to include...a leaf...
* Wider logos (e.g. 3:2) are preferred to square or stacked logos, but will consider all
* CMYK/Pantone safe and web safe please
* Please use color (encouraged!), but must also work in black and white, on black and white, would like to see all treatments
* Please be gentle with gradients
* Should not be photo-realistic
* Prefer a standalone abstract logo (e.g. Apple), also will strongly consider wordmarks, and hybrid wordmark/logos
* Prefer 2D vs. 3D treatments but will look at all
* Prefer non-serif, variable width, low kearned fonts...but suprise us!
* Wordmark fonts should not be common like Arial or Tahoma and should show some originality in font choice or design please. As an example we like Facebook's wordmark better than Twitter's.
* Wordmark should not be in italics please

For inspiration, logos we like a lot: Apple, Basecamp. Mozilla, Slicehost

Last, we hate to reiterate this because it's already in the ToS, but NO lifting of logos or logo parts from other design sites or other companies. We are quite familiar with the other sites and companies out there and will be checking...