[Actionchix] OLD old LinuxChix logo and Brazil

[Val Henson]

On 3/25/06, Sulamita Garcia <toskinha at gmail.com> wrote:
> First of all, I need to apologize for my message. Val, thanks for your time
> and patience to deal with it. It was not a good day for me, I answer without
> thinking it through. I'm very sorry.

:) If your last email is the worst thing someone says to me this week,
I'll be happy.  But thanks.  And I apologize in advance if this email
is not written well.

> > Which is "the old one"? Part of the problem is that we have a ton that
> > are all used.
>
> I always thought was this one
> http://www.linuxchix.org/graphics/linuxchick-sm_2.png

Oh.  That is the original logo, from way back when.  I have a story
about this logo.

> Because was the first I pay atention when I meet LinuxChix and I saw it in
> mugs and tshirts(which were sell a long time ago in ThinkGeek). And I think
> is a real mark from what people recognize us, and in that time I saw this
> logo in several chapters sites. So for several years I thought this was the
> official logo. I had no idea that there are no official logo.
> And I didn't like the new ones. I prefer the idea of a geek, which is what
> the "old logo" gives to me. So we already made tshirts and banner and
> pins... we even had named  her...

Wow.  A curvaceous woman dressed in bell bottoms, with a bare stomach,
a tight tank top, huge breasts, lots of jewelry, tons of makeup,
sunglasses, and a huge ponytail says "geek" to you?  It doesn't say
that to me, it says "I am an airhead, I spend my entire day thinking
about boys, and Britney Spears is my role model.  Oh yeah, those LInux
boys sure are cute!"  I wouldn't believe we were talking about the
same logo if you hadn't provided a link!  I guess this is a difference
in culture?

So, here is my story about the old old logo.

Back before I knew about LinuxChix, I got a job as a Linux kernel
developer.  I wondered if I was the _only_ active female Linux kernel
developer (this was in 2001 or so).  I googled for "women linux" and
came up with LinuxChix.

I was disgusted and turned off.  One of the main reasons was the logo.
 To me, it focused too much on the "I am a sexy female!" part and
almost not at all on the "Linux" part.  One of the main problems with
being a woman in computer science is the "groupie assumption" - that
you are not really into computers yourself, you just want to hang out
with the cool guys who do computers, and you buy your entry with the
fact that you are a beautiful woman.  The logo screamed "groupie" to
me - I mean, no computer or Tux in sight, just the word "LINUX"
printed across her (very prominent) breasts.  I did not want to be
part of a group that represented itself with that logo, because I want
to be taken seriously as a Linux developer in my own right.  So I
left.

About a year later, I was so lonely and desperate for the company of
women who shared at least one of my interests that I came back to the
LinuxChix web site and joined the mailing lists - in spite of the
logo.  The first thing I did was start a thread about replacing the
logo - and it worked.  It turned out that many other people felt the
way I did about the logo.  We had a contest, with all amateur entries,
and we replaced the old logo with many other logos.

I noticed that LinuxChix Brazil is using the old old logo.  My guess
is that the culture in Brazil is different enough that that logo isn't
offensive, or less offensive.  I understand that, and I think it's
great that there _is_ a LinuxChix Brazil and that you're using any
logo at all.  But I still get comments from (non-Brazilian) people
saying that they saw the LinuxChix Brazil web site and now they think
that LinuxChix is for women who just want to be looked at, who want to
hang out at Linux conferences and date the men who do Linux but don't
do anything with Linux themselves.  In other words, that logo makes
them think that LinuxChix is a group for women who like men who do
Linux, not women who do Linux themselves.

Are you aware of anyone who responds to the logo this way?  Have you
asked people outside of your LinuxChix group what they think LinuxChix
is about, based on the logo?

> But, it is just my opinion. And as Val said, we can keep using this one or
> use the new one...

Anyone can use any logo they like.  LinuxChix doesn't exist as a legal
entity, and so we can't even pretend to control who uses the name on
the Internet.  I would personally prefer that the name "LinuxChix"
isn't associated with the old old logo, but there's nothing I can do
about it.

-VAL