Tux
Origins
A Little Penguin, also known as the Fairy Penguin in Australia and the Blue Penguin in New Zealand, inspired Torvalds to suggest using a penguin as the Linux mascot. |
Tux was originally designed as a submission for a Linux logo contest. Three such competitions took place; Tux won none of them. This is why Tux is formally known as the Linux mascot and not the logo.[7] Tux was created[8] by Larry Ewing using the first publicly released[9] version (0.54) of GIMP, a free software graphics package. It was released by him under the following condition:
Permission to use and/or modify this image is granted provided you acknowledge me lewing@isc.tamu.edu and The GIMP if someone asks.[10
The story behind Tux, Canberra Zoo. |
In an interview Linus commented on the penguin bite:
Linus: I've been to Australia several times, these days mostly for Linux.Conf.Au. But my first trip - and the one when I was bitten by a ferocious Fairy Penguin: you really should keep those things locked up! - was in 93 or so, talking about Linux for the Australian Unix Users Group.[13]