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Gallery of the Lamest Technology Mascots Ever
Wired has a gallery of their Lamest Technology Mascots which features some trollish links including Tux and a certain adorable devil. Also featured is the old Java mascot Duke which I always liked, and of course Clippy who these days pretty much exists only in cheesy Top X lists.
No seriously Tux rocks :) *tossing some herring*
...cannot be taken seriously. Come on, this thing was the unofficial symbol of the entire dot-com boom era, which subsequently made him the unofficial symbol of the dot-com bust. Not only that, but he was LAME. A *sock puppet* as a company mascot?!?!? Unless the "technology" you're promoting is a time machine to go back to 1970 and bring back Shari Lewis, you really should be considering a better mascot.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
the only mascot i can think of that isnt on this list is Konqi.
and tux is not lame. them's fightin words.
I would love to add this gallery to my "Gallery of Lamest Galleries Ever", but it stack overflowed when someone submitted it to itself.
biopowered.co.uk - catalytically cracking triglycerides for home automotive use since 2008. Just say no to big oil!
Why isn't he on the list?
...and on his hands and knees
I always thought this guy was one of the scarier technology mascots out there.
Wait, you mean that's not a guy in a rubber suit?
I'm not a BSD user because in my mind, the connection to BSoD (Blue Screen of Death) is too close. The devil icon doesn't help the death image even if the devil isn't blue. Is that a horrible reason not to use BSD or what?
Finally a use for my knowledge of useless Japanese image boards!
:P ). Be warned it is NOT work safe and you can see ANYTHING (from dead babies to hentai and a mix of both together). Unless you have a .jp IP or are using a proxy you may not post on the site, this is because when people have been given access people have abused it (4chan /b/ users spam the board with racism and such if they find a proxy), so you can just view not take part to those outside Japan.
Number 10 is the OS-Tans which spawned from 2ch (and Futaba, the image board connected to the forms known as 2channel, or 2ch for short). Each edition of windows has a linked character (I haven't seen Vista though) which links to the OS's "quirks". For example XP is a very smart girl who takes care of the rest (a well rounded OS basicly) where as ME is a complete idiot known for weilding leaks and doing the dumbest things she can. The OS-tans became so popular (even to the point of a magazine in Japan stealing their designs and using them without the original authors permission and hence being boycotted by many 2ch users) that other software started to get their own characters.
These range from Norton (who is a perverted old doctor) to the Mac girl (who likes to blow things up). As time goes by these girls all seem to remain popular and have become a solid part of the Japanese image board culture. It's very rarely to check the Futaba art boards (Oekaki and self made) without seeing at least once OS-tan pop up some where.
The author doesn't seem to have much of a clue about the girls and their characters, it's just shooting in the dark at "mascots" when the original author has suggested no such thing. Infact the original character designs are pretty much as open source as you can be with character designs, you can do what you like with them as long as you don't make a profit and don't try to claim you made them/not give credit to the mass community).
People looking for the OS-tans can try Futaba at http://www.2chan.net/ , you are most likely to see them on the random boards, the main 2 of which are on the third row 2 down ( and
I like muppets.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
After using linux on my desktop and getting minimal support for my non big guy video card (kyroII) and a few other issues that 2 months of my best searching, poking, installing, uninstalling, untarring, posting, and breaking couldn't fix a few years back, I came to realize WHY linux's mascot was a penguin -
And this is sure to get me modded down for flaming, trolling, etc, but its a joke...
Either installing and configuring linux was like an expedition to a cold, stark, barren wasteland, or using it was like living there...
One little aside, my little adventure with linux 5-6 years ago taught me that in order to use a non mainstream OS, you needed to use mainstream hardware... Odd, eh?
Or at least code drivers yourself.
Is it sad that I am more likely to recognize you and your posts by your sig than your name or UID?
No GNU Goat? I'm most certain this will get modding troll or w/e, but I love the free movement and always thought that goat was ill-conceived....
"All great things are simple & expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope." --Churchill
Where's the flying toasters? I remember the first time I saw them. I was 12 and I still thought it was lame.
You may enjoy the list of mascots at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mascots
Paid Q&A/Research
I always thought Duke resembled an Ouija planchette.
...which is that all computing mascots suck. The whole concept sucks. Unless the target audience of your software is young children, cutesy mascots are just stupid and annoying. A decent logo is useful for branding and recognition of your software, that's fine. But some stupid character to try and create some bizzare link in people's heads between your office software/OS/web browser and some "loveable" creature strikes me as incredibly pointless and just a little bit desperate.
"Sure, on the outside we're a multi-national billion-dollar corporation but, as this green koala clearly shows, on the inside we live in a playful world of whimsy with chocolate hills and marshmallow clouds."
Give me a break
Spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and stupid comments are intentional.
*sniff*... I loved the Pets.com mascot. How could you not like this face??
Unfortunately, what Wikipedia doesn't cover is why pets.com ultimately failed. The sock puppet, like many celebrities, turned to hard narcotics after he lost his high of the .com era. This, combined with a heavy spat with Triumph the Wonder Dog, pulled the plug on his career. The puppet got so down and out that he almost sold his Timex collar, just for one last hit (either of the narcotics, or on Triumph's head). Luckily, he discovered the Hakan and Associates rehab center, whom made a vain attempt to rescue his career. Not much detail is provided about his 12-step sponsor, 1-800-BAR-NONE or their brief collaboration on car commercials. The Pets.com mascot dropped off of the public radar soon after those commercials.
I heard from a friend that he's studying Buddhism under the Dalai Lama in Tibet in Exile. Apparently, His Holiness Tenzin Gyatso is training the Pets.com puppet to become a Lama who will wander the hills of Tibet looking for the yang srid. It is suggested that, due to resemblance of the Pets.com mascot to a childs toy, the 15th Lama may recognize the roaming monk as a good friend. Time will tell on that one though.
Looking at that mascot and wondering "WTF is it?", I'm inclined to think the pain killers came first. Nitrous oxide inspired it, and lignocaine made it seem like a good idea.
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CmdrTaco said: ...and of course Clippy who these days pretty much exists only in cheesy Top X lists.
Sadly, I still see Clippy every day on the monitor of a couple of the secretaries in my workplace.
The reason the FOSS mascots are silly is they were all made by nerds, and they're not trying to sell a product, so you don't have to be able to take it seriously.
Hey, this was a great operating system for its day, and you should all know something about it. Take a look at Melinda Varian's excellent paper (PDF warning) on the history of the great operating system. Twenty years ago, I was running VM systems that ran 20 to 40 mainframe guest operating systems, long before VMware and Xen. VM still has the best implementation of Unix pipes I've ever seen.
I still miss VM and the v/Bear, though I have one on my car's keyfob...
A clever person solves a problem, A wise person avoids it. -Einstein
Does Bonzi Buddy count as a mascot?
Although not quite as notorious as Clippy (but probably close) I think this one definitely ranked higher on the "annoying" chart
Yep... I'd like to come out of the closet as a Linux user who doesn't like Tux at all.
What annoys me is that I've never able to satisfactorily put my finger on exactly why I don't like it. Could it be:-
1) Same pose, same expression. Never changes.
2) Glassy-eyed vacant look.
3) Use in certain contexts where it appears unprofessional?
4) Too plasticky? Looks somewhat soulless, like a toy.
5) Childish, but not really "cute".
6) "looks fat, bored, lazy and apathetic and / or immensely stupid" (see parent poster)... that's actually not a bad guess.
Thing is... I like real penguins, and yet this anthropomorphic (or is it?) mascot leaves me cold to the point of active dislike. I don't like this version either; it's just too silly. Basically, I just don't like Tux; although I use Linux, I prefer the BSD Devil mascot. It's far from my favourite cartoon character, but it seem to has some "animation" or "life" to it. Tux doesn't really seem to project any personality; he looks like he's meant to, but it just doesn't come off.
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