At around 8:47 am on Thursday January 26, the social networks exploded. Twitter and Facebook were such a fiery mess you’d think the RIM network was down. The eruption of activity was due to the unveiling of Western’s new brand, an administrative initiative seven months and $200,000 in the making. The rebranding package, shaped by Toronto-based design firm Hahn Smith, equipped Western with a new name, logo, and website (thank god). It took all of about 15 seconds of browsing the trends to get the hint that the first reaction wasn’t necessarily positive. While #westernU and #uwo were trending in Canada, #ugh and #WTF weren’t too far behind. Using my knowledge of youth culture gathered from my time at the University of Facebook, I hammered down the reactions to three main groups: Continue reading →