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Richard Rauch wrote:
> On Sun, Oct 31, 2004 at 08:30:05AM -0700, Andy Ruhl wrote:
> Fernando: I like your idea, from the sound of it, but I doubt that
> a radical redesign of the logo is going to happen again anytime
> soon.  (Might I also suggest that the dots be solid-filled circles
> with the letters 'N', 'e', 't', 'B', 'S', and 'D' cut out?)  But
> I think that it's too late for that.

Absolutely. On the other hand, NetBSD could change it's logo on a
monthly or weekly basis to fit everyone's and nobody's taste. Don't
we need a hymn or a jingle?

> For better or for worse, I don't expect to see the new logo completely
> redone anytime soon.

This is basically an emotional issue, in my opinion. The relevance for
the project is pretty low. NetBSD needed a proper longer, now it has one.
Whether it's the optimum won't matter for anyone but the few people
posting to this or related threads. The question is also, whether "we"
have to like the logo or whether it's just supposed to "work". Have
you asked a random stranger what he thinks about the old/new logo? If
anything matters, it's the opinion of people who haven't heard of NetBSD
yet. People won't turn their backs on NetBSD because they dislike the
new logo.
=20
> Christian: (I read on the web, too; in this case I happen to be
> replying to an off-list CC: though; (^&  I'm adding you to the reply
> chain of this so that you will have it in your mailbox.)

Thanks.
=20
> It's not that the logo has to be politically incorrect.  Rather it
> is that it doesn't have to be politically correct.  Recall that
> political correctness was one of the motivators and was so strong
> a motivator that it forced some rules into the contest so that the
> new logo would be PC.

I never perceived this being the main reason. The main reason was: it's
too complicated. Hands up, who had this "logo" printed anywhere? Reading
other related threads now and some months ago, many people seem to
confuse "Beasty" with the (old) NetBSD "logo". The (old) logo never was
a logo, it was a *picture* i.e., with many details and drawn with a pen,
thus not properly reproducible nor scalable. Its message (if there was
any implied) was confusing. "NetBSD - we smash Computers"? Rather no message
than a confusing one that might piss of people. Regarding taste, I can
only speak for myself but the old "logo" was just plain ugly. The daemons
look neither cool nor cute i.e., not sympathic in any way. I can't recognize
*any* ugliness in the new logo whatsoever. In the worst case it's boring.
However, have you seen the inverted version with a black background? Hell,
it's goddamn simplistic yes but black/gray/orange is a very tasteful mix in
my eyes.

In any case, I highly doubt that we will never agree on a logo due to
the very different (and apparently very high) expectations. In my opinion,
the NetBSD Foundation has the right to decide which logo is the official one
and they don't have to ask the users even though that would have been nice.
Some people would prefer a mascot-like logo i.e., a daemon or kind of
animal while others want a serious unexciting logo as contrast to geeky
penguins or blowfishes. Not using a daemon is rather a device to keep enough
distance to FreeBSD. No matter what beasty-variant NetBSD would use, most
people would probably have FreeBSD in mind. A lot of people (who should know
better) use "BSD" when they talk about FreeBSD or OpenBSD. Thus, NetBSD
needs a completely different logo.

Another example, consider the completely boring Sun logo. I'm not a fan
of Sun but their newer machine with a logo featuring a blue backlight look
really cool. I could imagine slapping a logo with an illuminated orange
flag on my machines (not that I'd give a damn about case modding usually).

> It doesn't matter how good a new logo would
> have been, if it wasn't PC it wouldn't even fit the basic requirements
> of the contest as I recall them (certainly certain non-PC possibilities
> were ruled out)---it probably wouldn't be submitted, much less allowed
> to win.

As far as I can, the PC issue is only partially about christians that
have a problem with horns. Those that really have a problem with that,
do most likely recognize computers and the internet as work of Satan.
They wouldn't use NetBSD nor any other OS anyway. The old image was
based on a scene from war and this just causes very weird impressions.
Would anyone have a problem with let's say an AH-64 Apache Longbow
as logo with the subscript ``Of course it runs NetBSD''. I'd like it
but I'd never suggest using it.

> Re. simplicity: I don't think that anyone has said in as many
> words, "The new logo is too simple," rather that it is pretty
> ugly.  That, at least, is my view.  *Simple* is good in a logo.
> In fact, I'd think that a further simplification would be worth
> considering: Drop the flag.

That would be OK if the font had any more character e.g., look at
the IBM logo - which is considered ingenious by many people. However,
NetBSD has neither sufficient media coverage nor any hardware to
present its logo. Trust me, apart from IT people nobody has ever
heard of beasty or OpenBSD's blowfish, well Tux is a little more
popular but I doubt it really helps them. I wouldn't care about people
who choose their OS based on its logo or mascot.

> In addition to being simpler, I
> think that it would improve the aesthetics.  And, it would
> be more satisfactorily renderable on an ASCII console.  (That
> last is something that NetBSD, of all operating systems,
> should not neglect.)

Yes, and it should work as tattoo on chicks. I for one disable annoying
MOTDs at once. They haven't invented it but such stuff appears Linux-ish
to me. I like my operating system because I don't see it (most of the
time) - don't confuse this with Windoze, there you see the OS all the
time.
=20
> Sean: I'd love to see the other contestants, just out of
> curiosity.

I'm pretty sure we all would discover a logo we liked more than the chosen
one. That's not the issue. The issue would be to agree on one. More often
than seldom it's the aloud minority that complains. That's why orders
from "above" are quite alright - everyonce in a while.

--=20
Christian

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