In August, I got excited about a public competition for a design to be painted on top of the Space Needle (and about the history of the color orange that's on it now).

The competition has now come to the point where there are six roof options—or, actually, there are five, since one of the options is simply to keep it the color orange that's on it now.

These are the options. You can vote on them.

I tried to vote, but I could not muster the sufficient enthusiasm even to press my finger in a clicking motion.

Why are these so deadly dull? They could have been spat out by a marketing firm.

In addition to being thematically boring, there's this problem with the designs, described well by a reader who sent me this comment in email:

Especially disappointed that these designs all treat the Needle's roof like a flat doughnut and not like the trapezoidal, hourglassy shape it's seen as 99.9% of the time.

Oy. New competition: Can you propose any designs duller than these?