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!)
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.
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.
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).
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.
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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.
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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 🤠.
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!)
I’m sure there’s a place where she could still work… like maybe the 404 page or the maintenance page?
We’ll look into places for this to exist
This feels like an answer for a trivia question years down the line.
“Fun fact, the 404 page bee is actually the old logo from way back in the day!”
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.
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.
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).
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).
Thank you for explaining how this works! It’s interesting ☺️
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 🤠.
Has it been made into a plushie yet? Just asking 😁
(BTW, TIL bee rustling is an actual IRL crime)