Actually design critiques, of public brands, are covered by the Fair Use doctrine. Even more so since @malicered does often write about design.

That he may earn from this article does not equate to commercial use either, not in the sense that taking the logo and put it in his avatar would be a potential Commercial use since he does occasionally provide design services (via Steemit even).

No permission required to post the logo's image file in this post. But he would have to ask if he were to change the logo in @cryptoctopus's avatar to the new Steemit logo.

Using a logo as part of a news update and design critique about a public brand: Fair Use. Even if earns from this and unsolicited analysis.
Branding himself with the new Steemit logo, in order to sell more avatar designs to Steemians: explicitly outlawed now.

What are the four important conditions for Fair Use:

• the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
• the nature of the copyrighted work;
• the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
• the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

Source: Copryright and Plagiarism specialist Jonathan Bailey