Open Source Tattoo

[samwho]

Hey all,

I've been trying to brainstorm a really good idea for a tattoo for months and months and I think I finally hit on a really good idea.

I wrote a post about it on my blog and here's a link to it: Sam Wants a Tattoo (http://lbak.co.uk/blog/26/09/2010/sam-wants-a-tattoo/).

Here's the contents of the post if you don't wanna go over and read the original post :) :

The people who know me best will think this is hugely hypocritical. I have chastised people who get tattoos and piercings for years because I think they are pointless. I still do, don’t worry, that part hasn’t changed. The tattoo that I want, however, will not be pointless :) I want it to represent some of my beliefs, beliefs I believe are not going to change. Here is my design idea so far:

http://lbak.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Photo0315-300x225.jpg (http://lbak.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Photo0315.jpg)

Click on it to see it full sized (and with a small portion of my leg on the left hand side). The idea is to have the Glider symbol and in each of the 5 squares put a symbol of something I believe in. Here is the list I have so far:

Tux: Tux is the symbol of Linux. Linux is the free operating system kernel originally thought up by Linus Torvalds. It currently powers a majority of servers as well as growing in popularity for desktop/laptop computer usage (though it still has a minuscule market share). It is maybe the most prominent example of the success of Open Source software and collaboration.

Ubuntu: Recently (in the last year or so) I made the change to Ubuntu from Windows permanently. Ubuntu is built upon Linux and their philosophy can be found here: Ubuntu Philosophy. I think the philosophy explains why the Ubuntu logo is in my tattoo design ^_^

OSI: OSI stands for the Open Source Initiative. OSI is the advocate of the Open Source methodology. Their home page explains what they do: OSI Home Page.

Creative Commons: The Creative Commons is a set of licences designed to increase collaboration and freedom in education, science and culture. To find out more about them, click here: What is CC?

Science: Last and certainly not least is science. I believe heavily in and respect the efforts of people working on improving the world through science and I believe the things that dedicated scientists have done have truly changed the world for the better.

So that explains my choices. Any comments and constructive criticisms on them are welcome Now, if you think you can actually give me a design for the tattoo (that isn’t just a rough sketch) I would be eternally grateful! You will probably be designing the tattoo that all open source advocating hackers will use from now on :p

[red_Marvin]

I would not recommend getting a tattoo depicting a company or organization logo, for the reason that you or they might change in the future in a way that you do not want to be associated with them anymore.

If you want to embrace a specific philosophy, I think that you should go with a tattoo that does so in a more general way than being the logo of a company/organization that happen to have adopted that philosophy.

The glider though is a pretty good idea imo, and thinking of it, if I were ever to get a tatoo myself that would probably be one of the top contenders. It is an in the subgroup generally accepted mark representing the endorsement of the hacker mentality without being centrally controlled.

[samwho]

I hadn't thought of it that way, red_Marvin... You raise some good points :)

I do like the glider... Both in its simplicity and what it represents. Spent hours playing with the Game of Life when I first found out about it ^_^

Would it look good as a tattoo, do you think?

[koenn]

Would it look good as a tattoo, do you think?

http://catb.org/hacker-emblem/tattoo.jpg

http://catb.org/hacker-emblem/Alberto_glider.jpg