New FreeBSD Logo Contest to Close on June 30

xbsd writes "The Official FreeBSD Logo Contest is closing on June 30, 2005. As of June 23 they have received 429 compliant submissions, but if you got the skills you still have a few hours left to submit a proposal. Now, is it time for F/OSS projects to follow NetBSD and get a more polished (or as some would say, 'corporate') public image?"

Comments

Re:I like beastie

[MBCook]

If you go to the linked site, they say that Beastie will continue to be the project's mascot, but they simply don't have a logo. If they put Beastie on something, someone either knows what the product is, or they don't. What they need seems to be something more like the "Slashdot" graphic in the top left of every page here on Slashdot. No-one said the logo can't include Beastie.

Re:Long live Beastie

[nbritton]

Beastie is NOT going anywhere.
This is simply a logo for things like letterhead, marketing, conveying a "professional" corporate image, etc.

What's the first thing that pops into your head when you look at this logo?
What about this one?
And this one?
This too?

Anyways.......

Beastie isn't going anywhere.

[ulib]

From the Fine Article:

Q. Please save Beastie!

A. Beastie will continue to represent the FreeBSD Project as our mascot. We won't kill Beastie. The closest logo-like thing that we have now is shown below, and we are looking for other options to be used like there. The new logo design may or may not include Beastie, or even a stylized representation. Again, Beastie is still alive!

There are times when you want to present yourself with a logo, not with an image of the mascot. That's how I understood it, and to me it makes a lot of sense.

--
Requiem for the FUD

Re:Long live Beastie

[nbritton]

Here are a few reasons why we need a logo...

1. Beastie is generic, it's associated with all of the BSDs and not specific to FreeBSD.
2. We don't have a logo. Beastie is not, and never was, the logo for FreeBSD.
3. Copyright and Trademark issues, Marshall McKusick holds all rights to him.
4. Beastie is too complex, economically, for print media.

Let me say again... Beastie is NOT being booted from FreeBSD and no, we did not cave into the demands of right-wing religious people. This is all about branding, marketing, and PR. And you could use the mozilla project as a case study of some of the positive side effects this could have for us.

Re:I like beastie

[Shanep]

FreeBSD, being rather generic in focus, is a tougher one to design for. Maybe the guy who owns the beastie copyright will transfer it to FreeBSD (or grant unlimited license, etc.) and beastie will become official.

He's a cool guy actually. He's written books, papers and BSD code and most recently on a book on FreeBSD, so who knows. I don't know if FreeBSD would want exclusive rights to Beastie though. Since Beastie has such a general BSD history, FreeBSD would probably still want an image for their own identity.