If everyone starts aiming for the little blue center, I wonder if people have a better chance of clicking the icon. Maybe they thought of it like extra padding around navigation links. When we aim for the original icon and miss by a couple pixels, nothing happens. If we are drawn to aiming for the little blue circle and miss by a couple pixels, Chrome still opens.
Here's a more design oriented discussion: http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/chrome_l...
I, for one, just switched to the Dev channel for the updated icon.