Why the penguin?

On Thu, 2003-07-17 at 12:43, Derek Neighbors wrote:
> Actually... It's a two fold story...
>
> The first half of the lore is that Linus was bitten by a penguin. Ever
> since that time he kind of "liked" penguins. This was a kind of an early
> Linux Kernel list explanation for choosing Tux.
>

The nip actually happened at the Canberra Zoo in Australia. Linus went
to the zoo with Tridge and you can reach the penguins quite easily. The
pen is marked that the penguins bite. Linus reached over and tried to
touch on and got nipped.

You would never see a zoo like that one in the us, you would end up in
court as many critters could be reached if you tried, they just have
warning signs and expect you to follow them!


> Today Torvalds is claiming it as myth, but its a great story none the
> less. I believe Larry Ewing (the creator of Tux) went largely on some
> suggestions of Alan Cox.
>
> Supporting Stories:
> http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,42209,00.html
> http://www.isc.tamu.edu/~lewing/linux/
>
> Torvalds "biting" transcript with MSNBC:
> <Chris_MSNBC> CyberYoda: How did the Penguin become the Linux mascot?
> <Linus_Torvalds-> Partly accident, partly because I like penguins. Partly
> because I was bitten by a penguin.
> <Linus_Torvalds-> It was at an open zoo. I made my finger look like a
> herring - and the penguin fell for it. It was a very very timid bite.
> <grin>
> Source: http://farcaster.net/linus.html
>
> I spent a good deal of time with Larry at a Comdex a number of years back
> and we talked about Tux. At that time The Linux Store was still around
> and he was teasing Mark, the owner, they he still owed him a 48" Stuffed
> Tux. Because early on the usage rules for Tux, were that you could use it
> as long as you gave one of whatever you used it on to Larry if he asked
> for it. :) I think he had realized this wasn't a good way of doing things
> about that time and had already stopped, but it was funny to see him give
> Mark a hard time about it. Now I think he just requires attribution to
> himself and the gimp.
>
> -Derek
>
>
> Alan Dayley said:
> > This is the best explaination that I can find. The bottom line is that
> > it is what Linus wanted.
> >
> > http://www.linux.org/info/penguin.html
> >
> > Alan
> >
> > -------Original Message-------
> > From: Vaughn Treude <vltreude@deru.com>
> > Sent: 07/17/03 07:59 AM
> > To: plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
> > Subject: Why the penguin?
> >
> >>
> >> This is a question that has been bugging me for some time - why is the
> > Linux
> > mascot a penguin? I've googled it, only to find repetetive quotes from
> > Linus
> > Torvalds saying how he wanted the penguin logo to look (cute, cuddly,
> > satisfied as if it just filled up on herring) but not WHY the penguin.
> > Perhaps he's a Monty Python fan like me ("There's a penguin on the
> > telly!")
> > Don't get me wrong, I think Tux is cool. I was just wondering why he's
> > a penguin and not a badger or an ocelot.
> >
> > Vaughn Treude
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