We hope this logo will look more friendly to people 💖

Thanks again to @UrLogicFails@beehaw.org for their great work!

Beehaw!

    •  Gaywallet (they/it)   ( @Gaywallet@beehaw.org ) English
      50•1 year ago

      There will always be groups of people who prefer the old and new. With more cohesive branding with our community logos and eventually a lemmy theme, I’m hoping we can rotate logos semi-regularly as a way to represent the diversity of our website and to help support amazing local artists.

      But that’s just my thoughts on it, in this case it was a logo commissioned for a specific purpose (app icon), and we wanted to align with that and celebrate new and great art (as well as continue to support the artist who’s helped us with all our community icons!)

        •  TerryTPlatypus   ( @TerryTPlatypus@beehaw.org ) English
          16•1 year ago

          That sounds like a good idea. Sometimes when I’m not able to visit the site, it’s nice to have a different piece of artwork there, to still share a part of Beehaw even when it isn’t able to connect to you at the moment.

        •  Evergreen5970   ( @Evergreen5970@beehaw.org ) English
          10•1 year ago

          All across Lemmy, I’ve noticed that users who don’t set profile pictures have a cute little mouse picture. I’m wondering if we could do something similar, where if you made your account on Beehaw and you didn’t set a profile picture, you get a cute little bee. Perhaps the bee that was just removed.

          On iOS, the maintenance page has some black text completely swallowed up by the very dark brown tree, so I’m definitely up for that being replaced.

          •  jarfil   ( @jarfil@beehaw.org ) 
            English
            10•1 year ago

            The little mouse icon is defined by the instance frontend that’s showing the comment, as a placeholder for users with “avatar: null”. Functionally, it’s intended for each instance/app to define how they want to render “avatar: null” user avatars (some apps, like Liftoff, just leave it blank, no mouse).

            if you made your account on Beehaw and you didn’t set a profile picture, you get a cute little bee

            I understand that would require setting a profile picture for people who didn’t set one themselves, which, given the federated nature of Lemmy, would kind of go against the idea of each instance/app deciding what image they show for people who haven’t set an avatar picture.

            Ideally, I think there could be an “avatar” and a “default_avatar” option for the target instance/app to decide whether they wanted to display their own (to preserve interface consistency), or the one suggested by the user’s home instance, but that isn’t part of Lemmy (yet).

      •  Enfield [he/him]   ( @nfld0001@beehaw.org ) English
        8•1 year ago

        There are a few examples that come to mind of rotating brand elements, both large and small, that make me think there’s a lot of potential to give a place and community some flavor and fun. I get the vibe you’re already on board with this kind of thing, but for the sake of putting it on record and giving everyone else a sense of what’s possible, I think it’d be cool to give a sense of the kind of things we can do in the future. Admittedly I’m 99% sure that these ideas are impractical, if not impossible, with Lemmy’s current UI abilities. Still, I think it may be good for the community to keep stuff like this in the backburner in case the potential opens up. This is spit balling, admittedly. Hopefully spit balling we’ll be able to act on eventually, though.

        -

        I remember Apollo for Reddit had a massive library of app icons that users could independently choose from. There was what I would call the primary mark and a few color or smaller derivatives of that, but there were also some wildly different ideas that were loosely tied to one another. Some were closely aligned with the original Apollo, others were barely connected to that visual identity. Either way, Chris got a lot of artists involved in the app icons aspect to Apollo. I forgot if they were commissioned or if it was some part of a community volunteering bit, but it was a cool way to add another touch of customizing and involvement to the app.

        Newgrounds is an example that I think goes even farther than Apollo. There are visual elements that remain consistent, like the logo, logotype, and site iconography. But every so often (IIRC, something like once a month or once a season,) they’ll bring in a community member to change up most of the site’s color scheme and the site’s padding graphics. I can’t seem to get the Wayback Machine to load a good capture on my end, so I went ahead and took a screenshot for archrival’s sake.

        -

        I’m leaning toward saying that the new logo is an improvement, design wise. Digital icons, let alone content like tab icons, will always require some sacrifices in detail in order to be legible. This logo still has some legibility loss in smaller sizes (although I’ll admit asking for that not to happen is a mighty tall order,) but I’m tempted to argue that it maintains its legibility better than the Bee Rustler. Mentioning visual unity with the community icons series is something I’d say is a plus, but if seasonal or community variants to the site logo is something that’s explored later, it makes that point not quite as meaningful.

        Bee Rustler was a cute lil’ thing and I loved her as much as anyone else, but admittedly I’m not so sure her graphic was a good fit for a logo. Chances are, however, that this is the kind of thing that would be most completely resolved with a comprehensive brand set that can accommodate community flavoring in aspects of it when the time comes. I’d think that’s getting well into long-term territory, however.

        Issues aside with Bee Rustler being a catch-all logo solution, I doubt that Bee Rustler is going away entirely any time soon. Mascots, and more broadly the sense of characters within a community, have a way of maintaining staying power. There’s going to be means and ways for Bee Rustler to show herself and still be part of the community lore, whether that’s officially or through the user base. Like I’ve still gotta see the Bug Crusher through before I throw the towel, and I don’t think that’s gon’ be the end of it from me or anyone else either 🤠.

  •  Aio   ( @Aio@beehaw.org ) English
    20•1 year ago

    I like it! Unfortunately i did just afew days ago make a homemade sticker for my backpack based on the old logo, I guess I’ll have to update it :)

  •  aka_oscar   ( @aka_oscar@beehaw.org ) English
    17•1 year ago

    I like how it has a different color for its hexagon. It does make it distinct enough to look like the “main” icon.

    Really like it myself, tbh. The cowboy hat does look more like a crown.

  •  forestG   ( @forestG@beehaw.org ) English
    15•1 year ago

    Not sure why, but the previous one made me smile. When I think about it, I believe there’s two reasons why.

    First, that the previous looked more like an actual insect. It clicked in my mind instantly as an insect and then I noticed all the cute details.

    Second, I think the angle was different. After being stung from bees a lot, some of them on the face, this angle makes me feel that it’s about to land on me. The previous angle (if I remember correctly) made me feel like I was an observer of the insect going about it’s life, whether wasp or bee, no feeling of threat.

    Not sure if I describe it properly, maybe just the usual old vs new and force of habit…

  •  jarfil   ( @jarfil@beehaw.org ) 
    English
    13•1 year ago

    This might be just me, but my first impression was the new logo felt more “aggressive”… like the bee is more confrontational by looking you straight into the eye and being ready to attack.

    I think I like more the one on @UrLogicFails@beehaw.org profile banner: less aggressive bee? …with the moustache making it more cartoonish, and less “oh f*ck, a bee is trying to sting me!”.

    But again, this is just my personal impression, and some possible bee fobia.