Nobody stepped up to design a Loadsharers logo, so I did it myself. Here it is:
Yeah, I’m not much of a graphic artist, but I can do a semi-competent job of whacking together a simple logo when I need to. If you’re an actual pro and think you can fix this or do better, have at it. The XCF SVG I made this from is in the Loadsharers repository at https://gitlab.com/esr/loadsharers
The only fly in the ointment is that I’m not entirely sure who owns the clipart image of Atlas that I’m using. I found it on some random sludgy “free” clipart website, in two versions: one with a copyright asserted by Can Stock, another inviting download from a site called Dreamlines. But I couldn’t find it by search and eyeball on either site. Email to Can Stock got no response.
I fear the only way I’m going to find out is if I get a Cease and Desist letter. At which point I’ll reply by saying “I tried…and have you got a vector graphics version I can buy the rights to?”
If you are a Loadsharer, feel free to display this proudly on your website, with a link to loadsharers.net. Someday there might be T-shirts.
UPDATE: The PNG this post originally linked to has been replaced with a PNG render of an SVG version made by A&D regular Rob Shinn that is ever so slightly cleaned up.
I’m not much of a graphics artist either, but I do have a suggestion (free, and almost worth it) if someone with Real Skill wants to take up the challenge of producing a different logo.
Two figures holding up the globe, both more stylized than the current Atlas, with the second figure being Hercules (with stylized lion-cape and maybe club). Not mythologically accurate, but fits the “loadsharer” concept and answers the objections about a logo that shows only the one Atlas-figure carrying the whole load.
Or perhaps flanking figures, holding up Atlas’s arms as those arms hold up the globe.
Why is one dude holding up the sky a good metaphor for the concept of sharing the load between multiple people? I find it confusing.
>Why is one dude holding up the sky a good metaphor for the concept of sharing the load between multiple people? I find it confusing.
It’s a visual metaphor for the situation of the LBIP.
The intent of the logo is a plea: “Help share that load”.
I think some kind of a “missing man formation” would make that clearer. Sorry, no idea how.
I’d buy a T-shirt.
Once again, the Southern California Linux Expo gives (or at least gave) free booths to charitable organizations. If someone wants to set up a Load Sharer’s booth, I will volunteer a half-day to help man it.
So that’s a way of saying you’re not going to shrug?
>So that’s a way of saying you’re not going to shrug?
Generally LBIPs don’t want to shrug. They’re not angry, they’re not persecuted – just stressed and sad and (yes) sometimes resentful because the world just doesn’t get how much it relies on them. They want to get on with the job, not make a political statement
As a testament to how RIGHT this logo is…
I’m reading the RSS feed, which on my box comes with no images. And my first thought is… it needs to be Atlas shouldering the world — a modern world, and an eternal, powerful Atlas.
So I come here to see this horrible artistic travesty… and there it is. Exactly as I envisioned it, right down to the fine details. Atlas as he came from the past with all his power intact for the future, and a modern globe marked to represent interconnectivity.
You can’t get much better than perfect-even-sight-unseen.
On a somewhat tangential note, does anyone know what’s happening in the Linux world these days regarding the SJW takeover? A quick search didn’t turn up any news or commentary since September ’18.
SJWs only ever elbow their way into spaces vacated by others that cannot stand the stench – they do not have the talent to create space for themselves.
Yeah, I know what an SJW is. What I don’t know is how things have progressed since September.
Have they been kicked out of Linux? If not, how much damage have they done so far? Is there any serious talk of forking? Has anyone tried the nuclear option (withdrawing permission to use their code contributions) that was being discussed?
You can’t kick a category of people out of a project. You can only kick people out.
Alright, let me rephrase that. How much influence do they still have over Linux?
Although, at this point I’m actually getting more curious about why there isn’t more public discussion of the issue than I am about the issue itself. The articles and videos all seem to be from 2018, like the matter just suddenly dropped off the radar shortly after first appearing on it. Even directly asking about it here isn’t getting me an answer, and I know some of you (including ESR himself) care a lot about Linux.
Why is that? We’re halfway through 2019, you’d think SOMEONE would have done an update for the general public by now. But it seems like no one wants to talk about it at all. Am I just not looking in the right place?
It’s quiet…too quiet.
Nice job – conveys meaning without being too busy. It even scales down to a polo-shirt logo size. Text alignment/font might need a tweak.
I like the logo and think it’s a good representation but aren’t you worried that people will read in a political meaning given the similarity to the atlas statue at Rockefeller Center which has been appropriated as a symbol for the objectivist movement.
I know it’s absurd but we live in an absurd time and I know that in many academic contexts the first thing people would assume seeing an icon like this on a webpage is that it’s some kind of objectivist thing.
It’s too exhausting trying to predict the myriad unknown and unknowable blobs of demented ‘offensitivity calculus’ rattling around in others’ heads…so don’t do it.
Take your stand. Be a man.
>I like the logo and think it’s a good representation but aren’t you worried that people will read in a political meaning given the similarity to the atlas statue at Rockefeller Center which has been appropriated as a symbol for the objectivist movement.
I was completely unaware of this. Though now that I think about it, “Atlas Shrugged.” Right. Duh.
Having looked at images of the statue, I’m not worried. It’s different enough that the only people likely to work themselves up over the resemblance are the sorts who would hate on LBIPs anyway for being a population mostly of “privileged” white males, or for any one of several other similarly batshit-crazy/crypto-Marxist reasons. There’s no point in trying to reason with or accommodate such people; they’re going to hate what they choose to hate, and choosing to defend civilization rather than wreck it is probably already sufficient to put us on their shit list.
I also note that the Wikipedia page says ‘Most Rainforest Cafe locations have a statue resembling this one in a waterfall with a fountain, with the words “Rescue the Rainforest” in green neon letters across the equator of the globe’. So the political valence of the symbol is not simple.
The Atlas/globe symbolism really took hold, despite the [mythological] fact that Atlas was punished by Zeus to hold up the heavens, not the planet.
It does make me wonder, though… If Atlas is holding up the planet instead of the sky then what the Hell is he STANDING on? :P
>It does make me wonder, though… If Atlas is holding up the planet instead of the sky then what the Hell is he STANDING on? :P
The luminiferous aether, obviously.
> “The luminiferous aether, obviously.”
Hah! I KNEW it was real! Take that, science! :p
It’s turtles all the way down.
What about the Fifth Elephant?
I wouldn’t be surprised if the luggage was involved at some point…
It’s always a Rincewind that some how fixes everything through sheer competence at incompetence.
Turtles of course.
It’s turtles all the way down.
I wonder if the statue of Atlas at the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof might get around this – apart from being distinct from those with political connotations, Atlas is assisted by a pair of “loadsharers” (representing Iron and Steam, as it’s a railway station).
That’s a great idea. I think it surely would since that tweek would remove the immediate resemblance.
I’m not worried about the people who would get worked up in the ‘OMG your logo is too reminiscent of…’ I was more worried about the people who would just see it on a website and make assumptions and thus not bother to investigate.
I mean it was the first thing the image brought to mind for me and I’m just worried that it might make it harder to gain support if you have to overcome an initial assumption.
But maybe I’m just being paranoid and it won’t matter to much. Just thought it was a concern worth bringing up to those with more experience in PR matters.
We’re talking about the crowd who accused Linus of inciting violence for joking that Greg Kroah-Hartman was a giant and “might squish you”. You are on their shitlist and they will read the political valence of your symbol in the worst possible way in order to rally the troops for a mob takedown.
But maybe not before they’ve forced the GIMP developers to change the program’s name (link currently unavailable).
You wanted a vector version. Here you go.
https://gitlab.com/rob.shinn/loadsharers/blob/master/loadsharers-logo.svg
I also created a merge request on Gitlab.
>You wanted a vector version. Here you go.
Nice! I’ll review and incorporate soon.
I’ve got a loadsharer alert.
Xorg is, effectively, moribund. It’s currently maintained by Red Hat, who have decided that it isn’t worth their time, so now it’s the next best thing to officially dead. If you’re not ready for the Wayland-pocalypse, maybe we can convince Keith Packard or somebody to step up if he knew there were people with money in vicinity of mouth to support him.
And by the way, Xwayland is nothing more than one of Xorg’s many back ends, so this affects you too if you’re relying on Xwayland.
If you want to avoid the cease and desist angle, I do know a few competent artists that would, possibly, be willing to toss a graphic together for a reasonable price.
>If you want to avoid the cease and desist angle, I do know a few competent artists that would, possibly, be willing to toss a graphic together for a reasonable price.
Rob Shinn’s reasonable price was “free”. :-)
I wasn’t that worried about the C&D, anyway. My response would have been “Great! I couldn’t pin down who had the rights, before. Please take my money.”
Not very difficult to track down:
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-vector/illustration-titan-atlas-holding-earth-165130190
>Not very difficult to track down:
Thanks. I tried all the relevant keywords I could think of and didn’t turn that up. Have bought the required rights.
NP, next time just right click and “search google for image” or tineye, they’re both quite impressive.
Isn’t it royalty free? What did you buy?
>Isn’t it royalty free? What did you buy?
It’s royalty-free free but you pay a one-time fee for the license. You can look up the Shutterstock Standard License if you’re curious.
Not long after coming across these load sharers posts, I also came across a similar effort, Tidelift. What do you think of it?
https://tidelift.com/
I don’t know… I trust ESR because I know he won’t buckle under to SJW pressure. I’m worried that these guys are already infected with the SJW mind virus–one of their values is “Inclusivity”…
>Not long after coming across these load sharers posts, I also came across a similar effort, Tidelift. What do you think of it?
Interesting. It’s aimed differently, at projects that have a closer coupling to corporate development work. I’ve signed up as the giflib maintainer.
ESR, it seems that the logo on your LBIP adviser page is broken: http://www.catb.org/esr/loadsharers/