I think there was a HN discussion about this recently, but I missed it. Anybody know why they made this decision?
1. They are planning to get rid of it. Google has way too many non-removable elements as is, even using so called compact mode. Right now they have two or three bars that could be smashed together with a few modifications. This is doubly true if they get rid of a giant useless logo that stalks you throughout your pages.
2. People were clicking it by accident. As a heavy net user, I don't feel this, but perhaps older or tablet users (but then why not fix it for them) were clicking it and pulling themselves out of Gmail. I could see this being extremely frustrating for a user trying to click the mail or search button.
3. They wanted to shift the functionality to the black bar. This is sort of a combination of the above two. The Google logo is pretty ambiguous. When I click it do I want to reload the page? Do I want to go to the Google homepage? Do I want iGoogle (why did they ruin Reader temporarily but not fix the mess that is iGoogle)? Do I want to search with the bar next to the logo? This is compounded by the fact that it has a context based search bar next to it. I know what that bar does but the context search UI is pretty ambiguous for a first time user.
At that point, the Google logo could become... err... well they tried to turn it into an all-google-properties dropdown previously, so who knows, maybe they'll try again later?
No trust me, you will try and click it everyday. My former college had, and still has, a link-less logo; that didn't stop anyone from trying to click it. It was actually a routine point of conversation in the beginning web classes about just how bad of a design flaw that was because the rest of the web adds a hyperlink to logo's.
If you have a company-esque logo, it should always, always, always take you to either the landing page; or your personal account page if in a logged-in state; depending on your personal needs.
Seems believable to me anyway... for instance I read mail almost entirely on my phone now and never log into the gmail.com. Since I'm not using their mail app I never see their ads.