Re: Linux Logo prototype.
Linus Torvalds (torvalds@cs.helsinki.fi)
Thu, 9 May 1996 17:48:56 +0300 (EET DST)
      
      Somebody had a logo competition announcement, maybe people can
send their ideas to a web-site..
      
      Anyway, this one looks like the poor penguin is not really
strong enough to hold up the world, and it's going to get squashed.
Not a good, positive logo, in that respect..
      
      Now, when you think about penguins, first take a deep calming
breath, and then think "cuddly". Take another breath, and think
"cute". Go back to "cuddly" for a while (and go on breathing), then
think "contented".
      
      With me so far? Good..
      
      Now, with penguins, (cuddly such), "contented" means it has
either just gotten laid, or it's stuffed on herring. Take it from me,
I'm an expert on penguins, those are really the only two options.
      
      Now, working on that angle, we don't really want to be
associated with a randy penguin (well, we do, but it's not politic, so
we won't), so we should be looking at the "stuffed to its brim with
herring" angle here.
      
      So when you think "penguin", you should be imagining a slighly
overweight penguin (*), sitting down after having gorged itself, and
having just burped. It's sitting there with a beatific smile - the
world is a good place to be when you have just eaten a few gallons of
raw fish and you can feel another "burp" coming.
      
      (*) Not FAT, but you should be able to see that it's sitting
down because it's really too stuffed to stand up. Think "bean bag"
here.
      
      Now, if you have problems associating yourself with something
that gets off by eating raw fish, think "chocolate" or something, but
you get the idea.
      
      Ok, so we should be thinking of a lovable, cuddly, stuffed
penguin sitting down after having gorged itself on herring. Still with
me?
      
      NOW comes the hard part. With this image firmly etched on your
eyeballs, you then scetch a stylizied version of it. Not a lot of
detail - just a black brush-type outline (you know the effect you get
with a brush where the thickness of the line varies). THAT requires
talent. Give people the outline, and they should say [ sickly sweet
voice, babytalk almost ]"Ooh, what a cuddly penguin, I bet he is just
_stuffed_ with herring", and small children will jump up and down and
scream "mommy mommy, can I have one too?".
      
      Then we can do a larger version with some more detail (maybe
leaning against a globe of the world, but I don't think we really want
to give any "macho penguin" image here about Atlas or anything). That
more detailed version can spank billy-boy to tears for all I care, or
play ice-hockey with the FreeBSD demon. But the simple, single penguin
would be the logo, and the others would just be that cuddly penguin
being used as an actor in some tableau.
      
      Linus