Hey all,
on of the things I particularly like of the PHP community are the elephpants (see https://afieldguidetoelephpants.net/), plush toys which work as mascot for several PHP related projects.
I was wondering if something similar could be done for the Haskell community. I’m imagining a purple husky, but could be whatever.
I think it could be a nice tool to sustain the growth of a friendly community. What do you think?
In go we have the gopher mascots. While Rust has the ferris crab. I have both on my shelf right now.
Maybe Haskell should adopt a cute mascot as well. This can also serve as marketting tool.
Heck, even good ol’ Linux has the Tux penguin mascot.
As per the choice by O’Reilly for the cover of Real World Haskell, we already have the hercules beetle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hercules_beetle
Alternately, there’s the narwhal: https://wiki.haskell.org/File:NarleyYeeaaahh.jpg
Harry the Hercules beetle
How about “Hasky” the beetle 
Adding this to the list of things I didn’t know I needed. A purple plush narwhal or beetle would be great!
I can’t think of anything more glorious than Hasky the husky 
I think this is a great idea! I do not have any specific proposal but I think something friendly over something “cool” is preferable.
To have names that refer to fundamental concepts (like Monad) could be good to make those concepts friendlier. However, it could also make the mascot itself more unfriendly “Even their mascot has a name I cannot understand”. Maybe it is good if people just can start using Haskell and without noticing learn those concepts.
If that is true, that would suggest that a name that is relatable and not directly connected to infamous terms is the best.
I would love to have a Haskell mascot 
Making the language friendlier can help newcomers overcome the fear of starting! Haskell often can look overly intimidating and scary, and it doesn’t help with learning 
In Kowainik, we were also thinking about the Haskell mascot. And we came up with “Lemon Ada”. There’s a hidden pun with “monada” inside the name but it doesn’t scare people immediately. Also, I believe this mascot helps with promoting diversity and women in tech.
DISCLAIMER: We’re not professional artists; this is just a sketch.
These are all great ideas!
What I see missing here is an organization who could organize ideas and also lead the actual production of the plush toys (or stickers, or whatever deemed appropriate), while keeping the profits of the sell. I wonder if the @haskell-foundation would be interested in such a thing or if it goes outside its role
I have used https://www.stickermule.com/ a lot for stickers and they are great (I’m not affiliated in any way, just a happy customer). They do not do plush animals though. After doing some research (a 90 seconds search ) it seems like there are several companies that do just that, for example https://www.stuffedanimalpros.com/mascot-stuffed-animals/. I have never used them so I do not know anything about price or quality.
But I guess the bigger issue is to to decide on the actual mascot, or decide on how to make the decision .
I love this thread, keep it going!
We’re exploring a merch store for the HF, and would certainly be open to carrying a plush.
On the HF Slack we have a #merch-shop channel to discuss ideas, too, but I’ll definitely be watching this thread.
I like this. Both the name and the play on words. I understand that it was an early sketch but I quite like nevertheless - but I think it is good if we avoid stereotypical “girl” attributes like long eyelashes, I feel that is a bit counter-productive. (I do not have any problems with the mascot being clearly feminine but I think there are better way to express that).
One downside is that lemons are not very cuddly though …
Talking to some friends I realized that most languages, etc. have picked somewhat uncommon animals as mascots – camels, gophers, etc. Ideas for Haskell mascots have followed suit.
But we don’t have to accept this state of affairs. The above means that the most common animals are wide open. In particular, no language has just said yet “our mascot is a cat.” Not like an especially interesting or exotic cat, or a particular cat with a particular name belonging to a particular person. Just, a cat, like, in general. See any cat? That’s our mascot!
Haskell is a great language, it deserves a top tier mascot, common, recognizable, widely loved. Let’s take cats. Literally nothing is stopping us. (Also we get cat theory puns as a bonus). See a cat anywhere in the world? Think Haskell! Now that’s branding.
Didn’t SPJ call his cat Haskell? I think I remember that from the escape from the ivory tower presentation on youtube.
Edit: yes, at 17:00:
Yes: we have a cat, and he is indeed called Haskell. My children insisted on the name. “We all know that Haskell is your first child, so we should have a member of the household called Haskell”.
Haskell is pretty old now, and sleeps a lot. (Maybe he is garbage collecting.)
Simon
I like this idea! Then we could have Cat the Cat (Cat as in both Catherine and the animal cat)
do not forget that Cat could be a reference also to category theory!
