After I had created my previous web site, I was looking for a favicon. Then I decided to use the hacker symbol:

It is known as glider in Conway’s game of life. I like it because the game has very simple rules and it is good representation of the computer logic, while glider is a life form which progresses as a neighborhood. And yes, I consider myself a hacker for a long time. Recently, hacking and the hacker culture has been commercially marketted, so now more people know that it’s not just cracking computers and accounts. But let me state what I understand from hacking with a quote from Richard Stallman: “[H]acking means exploring the limits of what is possible, in a spirit of playful cleverness.” This exploration involves questioning the status-quo and challenging the rules of both administrations and nature. I have more comments on hacking culture but that’s for another post, now let’s continue with the logo.

The template I used1 for the blog involves a logo. Apparently, new trend is to put a circular cropped photo of the author. Although it makes more sense than designing a logo or using a stock image, I don’t want my fellow readers to feel being watched and judged by my stare. Thus, I needed a logo.

Glider completes its cycle in exactly 4 iterations. As a matter of fact, 4 allows a very special form in pop art. Since this web site will be a combination of art reviews and informatics, I though this would make a very nice logo:

But, as expected, square form did not match the logo size. Then, I tried this:

Unfortunately, the colors did not blend well with the rest of the site. Therefore, I had to fall back to one of these sliglthly more boring versions:

Although my original design couldn’t make it to the logo of this web site, I am sure I can use it in the future. If you wanna play with it, the inkscape file is here.

  1. More like, I ripped from rsms.me ↩