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We have the name (CrossValidated.com), now it is a good time to revive this topic. The final design will be made by Jin Yang, but we can give him some ideas. So:

  • What ideas for a logo do you have?
    Can be a description, visual concept, sketch; Jin prefers grayscale pictures, while they are not color-biased.
  • What should be the colour palette of the site?
    This is a standard starting point; what is "the colour of statistics"? Amaranth? Light? Dark? Colorful? Cool? Warm? Is it also a colour of statistical computing?
  • What should be the design style?
    Modern/old-school? Baroque/simple? Stack-overflowish/completely different?
  • What the design itself should resemble?
    Random inspirations; data sheets, Gaussian curves, bookshelves, boxplots? Some pictures/photos can be also useful.

One answer per idea, so we can vote.

Like our site name, it needs to be something that reflects the full scope of our site... statistical analysis, data mining, machine learning, probability, data visualization and statistical computing.

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    $\begingroup$ Thanks for starting this thread! Please keep ideas coming! $\endgroup$
    – Jin
    Oct 1, 2010 at 10:32
  • $\begingroup$ @Jin Any updates on the design? $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Oct 14, 2010 at 19:49
  • $\begingroup$ @Shane, it should be soon. btw not sure the policy has changed about the 90 day launch mark. See bit.ly/d4Nept But it will happen soon. Thank you for your patience. $\endgroup$
    – Jin
    Oct 28, 2010 at 0:34

19 Answers 19

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One more in the same fashion:

alt text
alt text alt text

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    $\begingroup$ This one is directly inspired by stats.stackexchange.com/questions/1826/… and SE logo. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 24, 2010 at 11:35
  • $\begingroup$ This is definitely my favorite. Great job with these! My primary thought: it might be better to have the logo itself be more square, and maybe more proportional to the text size? More like the serverfault logo: serverfault.com $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Sep 26, 2010 at 17:23
  • $\begingroup$ what would be an interpretation of this logo? $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 26, 2010 at 21:20
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    $\begingroup$ See my first comment, it is 5-fold CV scheme (red test-set and blue train-set interchanging). The overall shape is somehow similar to the SE logo, but this is rather a side effect. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 26, 2010 at 21:23
  • $\begingroup$ @mbq I see the idea now. Isn't that too close to the concept of 'crossvalidation'? Perhaps, the logo should be a bit more neutral and lean the opposite direction (i.e., away from crossvalidation) to capture the diversity of our community. $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 26, 2010 at 22:12
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    $\begingroup$ @Srikant: I completely disagree. The idea here is that the logo represents cross-validation, and that cross-validation is a description of what we do on the site. So the logo should be as close to showing cross-validation as possible. $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Sep 27, 2010 at 14:07
  • $\begingroup$ @Shane Let me re-state my perspective so that it is clear where I am coming from. The site's name is 'crossvalidated.com' which reminds one of cross validation. However, I rather not have the logo represent the concept of cross validation literally as in the above logo. Such a literal representation may perhaps 'tune off' certain members of the community we wish to attract and retain. Thus, the logo should reflect the concept but perhaps tangentially. Another interpretation of the site name is what we do: 'We cross validate answers.'. $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 27, 2010 at 15:48
  • $\begingroup$ We cross validate by letting our diverse community to provide multiple answers to the same question and via voting. Thus, a logo that reflects this cross-validation mechanism (e.g., wheel + check of the other logo proposed by mbq) would perhaps be more subtle than a logo like the above. In essence, I prefer the logo to be more 'playful' about the site name and not interpret it literally. In any case, as always let the votes decide! :-) $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 27, 2010 at 15:51
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    $\begingroup$ I personally think that one key aspect of a logo is that it should work as a favicon. This logo definitely does - you could reduce it to 5x5 pixels and it would still work. $\endgroup$
    – Matt Parker
    Sep 28, 2010 at 18:10
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    $\begingroup$ @Matt Good point; I had this in mind. This wheel-one also scales well to 16x16 with some line thickness tuning. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 28, 2010 at 21:38
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    $\begingroup$ What about making this more like a scatterplot where the coloured squares are randomly distributed on the blue background. It would then carry the idea of a common graphical method, randomness which is inherent in everything we do, as well as the CV idea. $\endgroup$
    – Rob Hyndman
    Oct 8, 2010 at 1:17
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    $\begingroup$ I like @Rob's idea which for me neutralizes to an extent the emphasis on CV. It also merges two ideas: 'scatter plot' + 'cv' which reflects the diversity of our community. $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Oct 8, 2010 at 19:49
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    $\begingroup$ Another aspect of statistics too often overlooked is Experimental Design. It's just struck me that that mpq's design bears a similarity to a Latin Square, and could be made to look more like one with the addition of some extra colors / patterns: t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:cVwte6cduExCdM:http://… (that's a bit too colorful but you get the idea) Possibly if we (pseudo)randomly permute the rows and columns (as you should before applying a latin square) we could get something that looks a bit scatterplottish too? $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 19, 2010 at 13:16
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How about a dynamically and randomly generated plot (probably a scatter), generated on pageload and using the Google Charts API? Something like this logo submission to a previous contest: http://arbitrarian.wordpress.com/2008/02/23/dynamic-logo/

The original idea changed based on the time of day, and the color of one of the lines changed as a function of the time.

alt text

This solution obviates the need to decide on a single static logo and color scheme, and a randomly-generated scatter plot seems to be consistent with this site's focus on data.

alt text

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    $\begingroup$ This is a neat idea! I prefer the idea of a scatter plot. $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Oct 19, 2010 at 13:18
  • $\begingroup$ This may suffer from the same problems as my suggestion: meta.stats.stackexchange.com/questions/269/… $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Oct 20, 2010 at 1:31
  • $\begingroup$ Indeed I have upvoted it, but I agree with @Shane that there is a problem that logo should be static to be recognizable among its instances. Yet it is a good idea for an overall interface. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 20, 2010 at 13:23
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    $\begingroup$ How about not randomly generated but based on some actual dynamic data? Obvious things might be to do with site usage, active questions, answers to date, etc... $\endgroup$
    – walkytalky
    Oct 20, 2010 at 17:39
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    $\begingroup$ I really like walkytalky's idea -- since this would mean the logo is actually conveying meaningful data, as opposed to simple random numbers. $\endgroup$
    – rapidadverbssuck
    Oct 20, 2010 at 23:03
  • $\begingroup$ Completely randomly generated is always dangerous: one fine day, it will resemble something NSFWish, like Lisa Simpson giving head or Putin taking it from Medvedev or whatever (these links are SFW, by the way). Even worse, some people might turn it into a game of sorts, constantly refreshing the page and trying really hard to get a point-and-laugh logo on purpose. This is the Internet, after all. A better idea would be to iterate through an array of pre-approved plots. $\endgroup$
    – RegDwight
    Oct 21, 2010 at 19:44
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Gaussian-like idea for "voting component", so that it has a statistical interpretation:
alt text

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    $\begingroup$ +1 This is excellent! $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Oct 31, 2010 at 18:29
  • $\begingroup$ I agree. Great idea. $\endgroup$
    – Rob Hyndman
    Oct 31, 2010 at 23:52
  • $\begingroup$ Very nice idea, but IMHO it will be confusing for new persons. They will not understand that it can be used to vote. $\endgroup$
    – Peter Smit
    Nov 3, 2010 at 14:05
  • $\begingroup$ @Peter This is also my concern, but I'd give it a try; we could also just add arrows to this concept. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Nov 3, 2010 at 14:39
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How about a logo like @mbq's answer wheel + check but with the following differences:

  • No check mark
  • The 'red' arc is changed to 'green'.

Update

I just now noticed that mbq had posted the following logo (which follows the above idea) in the voting thread. See image below:

       alt text

An interpretation of the logo would be:

  • Questions are at the center of the wheel.
  • The arcs represent various answers with green being the one that is actually selected as the 'correct' answer as indicated by the arrow that points to it from the center.
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Hideous animated pseudo-3d bar-chartPlease no bar charts in the logo or any other aspect of the design. They are horribly overused when other plots would be more appropriate.

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    $\begingroup$ Better bars than pies... $\endgroup$
    – walkytalky
    Oct 27, 2010 at 13:35
  • $\begingroup$ I certainly wouldn't argue with that. $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 27, 2010 at 17:56
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    $\begingroup$ +1 for an incredibly tacky bar chart. $\endgroup$
    – csgillespie
    Oct 28, 2010 at 12:27
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    $\begingroup$ Aint it wonderful - makes a great favicon too!-) i.imgur.com/mOqLI.gif Can't remember where i originally stole it from but just found a collection of irritating icons including this one at nectec.or.th/users/htk/gr01/anigifs $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 28, 2010 at 17:07
  • $\begingroup$ How about an equally atrocious pie-chart? Animated in the style of pac-man! Totally retro, totally rockin! $\endgroup$
    – ars
    Oct 30, 2010 at 2:43
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Why not posting a contest on 99designs.com or the similar? This worked very well with stackoverflow.com. StackExchange should have no problem with finding a budget for this task.

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Sans font. (more characters)

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  • $\begingroup$ I would upvote it if I could. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 26, 2010 at 17:09
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For the logo, another option would be to show a scatter plot with a best-fit line through it, possibly using a non-linear relationship (like loess) as in this example.

alt text

This has nothing to do with cross-validation, but it would certainly communicate the purpose of the site. I prefer the other option above, because beyond everything else it will be clearer.

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    $\begingroup$ If you made a few of the points a different colour it would give the suggestion of cross-validation $\endgroup$
    – Rob Hyndman
    Oct 3, 2010 at 11:11
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    $\begingroup$ I can't see how this could be a favicon though. $\endgroup$
    – Rob Hyndman
    Oct 3, 2010 at 11:11
  • $\begingroup$ @Rob These are both great points. $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Oct 3, 2010 at 20:10
  • $\begingroup$ I agree with Rob; nice idea, but too complex. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 7, 2010 at 8:58
  • $\begingroup$ I've started thinking a scatterplot with a fitted line is a good idea. As Shane said, it communicates the purpose of the site in a generally recognisable way. Clearly the above scatterplot is too complex though. One with around 20 points would probably be enough. Should be real data i think, preferably historic or iconic (in both senses!). $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 26, 2010 at 19:48
  • $\begingroup$ @Shane What's a favicon? $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 27, 2010 at 18:00
  • $\begingroup$ @onestop The tiny little logo that appears at the top of your browser when you're on a page (either in the address bar or on the tab). $\endgroup$
    – Shane
    Oct 27, 2010 at 20:49
  • $\begingroup$ @Shane - thanks, I never knew that's what that's called! $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 28, 2010 at 8:18
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How about a motif that combines a 'cross' (e.g., ✗), a 'check mark' (e.g., ✓) and a question symbol (e.g. ?)?

The idea is that our site 'cross validates questions'. Too tacky? Too obvious?

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My idea for logo below..... Or squarer with black 'leading'? StackExchange icon for comparison:

4x4 latin square in red and blues with white leading, curved edges and a speech bubble tail 4x4 latin square in red and blues with black leading, curved edges and a speech bubble tail StackExchange icon

My idea is to combine mbq's 'crossvalidated' logo entry with a 4x4 Latin square and keep a family resemblance to the StackExchange icon. The Latin square illustrates design of experiments, and also references the Fisher window and hence the "genius who almost single-handedly created the foundations for modern statistical science". It could also be a heat map representation of a contingency table. It needs a bit of tweaking and I'm not fixed on the colours - the present ones combine red/orange diagonal squares (like mbq's design) with various shades of blue (like the SE logo, and because, as everyone knows, blue is the colour of statistics!).

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  • $\begingroup$ I'm worried it looks a bit like HomeImprovement.SE logo (tiles). $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 21, 2010 at 7:40
  • $\begingroup$ I didn't think about checking for similarities with the other SE sites. Perhaps I should go back to the black leading, which looked more like Fisher's window too. It does look a bit like tiles, that's true. But where do I find the HomeImprovement logo? They are yet to launch too , and I can't spot any logos on their parallel thread meta.diy.stackexchange.com/q/171 . $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 21, 2010 at 8:52
  • $\begingroup$ I meant for me it seems like a HI logo, not is a duplicate. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 21, 2010 at 10:50
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    $\begingroup$ To be honest I've gone off this idea as a logo now, though i'll probably continue using it as my user icon. $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 27, 2010 at 17:59
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My first logo idea, already mentioned in the voting thread.
alt text

The general idea is to reproduce common illustrations of CV.

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  • $\begingroup$ this is nice. did you make it in inkscape? $\endgroup$
    – shabbychef
    Sep 23, 2010 at 22:03
  • $\begingroup$ @shabbychef Indeed this was CorelDRAW, but this doesn't matter. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 24, 2010 at 11:34
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Boxplots! Everybody likes boxplots:
alt text

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Blue is the colour of statistics. I'm not synaesthetic but this somehow seems natural to me. Maybe a blue + grey + white palette, perhaps with very limited use of red for highlighting as in the current 'beta' design.

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  • $\begingroup$ Instead of downvoting my answer, how about suggesting your preferred alternative colour scheme? $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 27, 2010 at 17:57
  • $\begingroup$ Hmm, no one has downvoted, at most removed upvote. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 28, 2010 at 17:40
  • $\begingroup$ When I added that comment my answer had a total score of -1. Whoever downvoted it must have subsequently undone their vote. I'd still welcome competing suggestions for the colour scheme! $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 28, 2010 at 21:44
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Inspired by Srikant's idea:
alt text

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  • $\begingroup$ Like the idea, but the "Q" in front just doesn't seem right... I mean, if I had not read Srikant's answer I would not have guessed it indicated "question" (because that's what it means, right?) :) $\endgroup$
    – nico
    Sep 25, 2010 at 11:50
  • $\begingroup$ I agree, the "Q" is confusing. Better to stick with the "?" originally suggested. $\endgroup$
    – Mike Lawrence
    Sep 26, 2010 at 14:41
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Gaussians! Everybody likes gaussians: alt text
At least may be ok for accepted-answer mark.

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  • $\begingroup$ I think I would like to see this in action before I would say I like it as an accepted answer (although it does seem pretty cool on its face). I personally really don't like the way the math se site has accepted answers faded into the background and that answers and checkmarks are in the same green color. $\endgroup$
    – Andy W
    Oct 28, 2010 at 16:28
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SOFU-like header:
alt text

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Violet (with green, possibly). Just because it has not been used yet among SE.

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  • $\begingroup$ I like violet as a colour and use it for my computer desktop background, but just wouldn't associate it with statistics somehow. I associate violet and green with gardening, or tennis - wimbledon, specifically. $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 28, 2010 at 21:54
  • $\begingroup$ As I wrote; this is to diverge from the rest of the network. Go to stackoverflow.com, scroll to the bottom and look at the site links. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 29, 2010 at 7:05
  • $\begingroup$ Maybe i have a narrow range of interests but I'd argue that it's only necessary to be quickly distinguisable from the sites on closely-related topics, i.e. stackoverflow, mathoverflow and math.stackexchange. Having said that and looking at them now, in fact the first two of those share much the same white-grey-blue-orange palette. I agree we do need something clearly distinct from that, which seems to argue against my previous suggestion! $\endgroup$
    – onestop
    Oct 29, 2010 at 13:07
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Serif font. (more characters)

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  • $\begingroup$ I would downvote it if I could. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Oct 26, 2010 at 17:09
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SeasonedAdvice-like header:
alt text

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