MYSQL is a very popular relational database software. The company claims that it has over 10 million installations worldwide. The company agreed to be aquired by Sun Microsystems in January, 2008. MySQL is named after co-founder Monty Widenius's daughter, My. The MySQL logo is a jumping dolphin - symbolizing the speed, power, precision and good nature of  the MySQL database and community. The new logo was designed by Renne Angelvuo and his colleagues at Priority Advertising Oy in Helsinki, Finland.

The name of the MySQL Dolphin is “Sakila,” which was chosen by the founders of MySQL AB from a huge list of names suggested by users in our “Name the Dolphin” contest. The winning name was submitted by Ambrose Twebaze, an Open Source software developer from Swaziland, Africa. According to Ambrose, the feminine name Sakila has its roots in SiSwati, the local language of Swaziland. Sakila is also the name of a town in Arusha, Tanzania, near Ambrose's country of origin, Uganda. This site runs on a MySQL database.

SuperBowl XLII is finally upon us, its the undefeated New England Patriots vs the New York Giants. With SuperBowl XLII right around the corner, I thought it would be apt to look at the various SuperBowl logos. The SupwerBowl is the championship game in the NFL and is played between the winner of the National Football Conference (NFC) and the American Football Conference (AFC). The SuperBowl is probably the most watched television event in the United States.

The SuperBowl logo varies each year and typically has something in it to represent the city where the game is being played. SuperBowl XXI and XXVII were played at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena and so have a touch of rose in the logo.

The Super Bowl XLII logo was also unveiled, featuring the shape of the state of Arizona in red. The two horizontal white stripes in the middle represent the vertical lines on the University of Phoenix Stadium. The turquoise Roman Numerals represent the Native American culture of Arizona. The red star represents the AFC and the blue star represents the NFC.

See all the SuperBowl Logos here.

Sify Technologies Limited is a major ISP company based in Chennai, India. It is a large internet network provider in India, with a wide array of internet based services. In January,  Sify Technologies unveiled a new corporate identity.   The new logo is a reflection of Sify's outlook and nature of business: a fresh, vibrant and eco-friendly green signalling a new,paper-free world, counterpoised by a business-like, dependable grey. The fonts are distinctive and futuristic. In graphic terms, the dot over the 'i' in the name has moved forward, and stands for the Company's promise to keep its customers and stakeholders ahead.

This is probably one of the first Indian companies to take a stance on eco-friendliness. Oddly, Xerox which unveiled their new logo today also chose a lower case text for the name.

eBay Inc. is an American Internet company that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell goods and services worldwide. In addition to its original U.S. website, eBay has established localized websites in several other countries. eBay Inc also owns PayPal, Skype, and other businesses. eBay.com is now one of the largest internet sites in the world and hosts millions of auctions at any given point on time. The eBay logo has intrigued me because its so simple and childlike in a way, but I have never been able to find out the origin of the logo until I stumbled upon one of the articles listed below in the reference section.

eBay.com started as an auction site in September of 1995 under the name AuctionWeb. The first logo that it put up was simple black text that said Auction logo on a black and white gradient bar. This logo was apparently referred to as the "Death Bar" logo (shown above)

The current logo was designed by Bill Cleary of the CKS group. The current logo was picked out of the many logos that were designed. Some of the key aspects are listed below

•  The primary colors of the logo depict fun, excitement and childlike energy. 
•  The overlapping letters of the logo are suggestive of the bonding within the eBay user community. 
•  The letters are not on the same level, they have what graphic artists call “baseline shift”. It gives the logo an offbeat feel and shows that company is not averse to change and that its a dynamic company that is always evolving. 
•  The unusual capitalization of the letters also shows that company accepts change when it is for good. Letter B is not capitalized in the logo even though the name of the company is written as eBay. Designers at CKS thought a capital B would look like a roadblock in the middle of the logo so they capitalized letter Y instead.
  

LG is a large South Korean conglomerate, which produces electronics, mobile phones, and petrochemical products and operates subsidiaries like LG Electronics. The LG brand originated from Gold Star, a popular brand name in Korea. The company now tries to promote its new tagline "Life's Good". The LG logo shown alongside is a fairly interesting logo. As you can see the logo has the alphabets, L & G in the form of a face. The symbol consists of two elements: the LG logo in LG Grey and the stylized image of a human face in the unique LG Red color.

•  The letters "L" and "G" in a circle symbolize the world, future, youth, humanity and technology. The symbol also represents LG's efforts to maintain close relationships with our customers worldwide.

Buy.com is one of the original online retailers in the United States. It began selling computers and electronics in 1997 , the company has since diversified its offerings to categories such as software, books, movies, music, games, toys, digital cameras, cellular phones, and magazines. Buy.com over the years has tried very hard to be like Amazon.com but clearly lags behind in the technology.

The Buy.com logo has undergone one major change over the years when in Jan 2000, it changed its logo to the simple Buy.com text. The original logo was a Big B enclosed in a C. I am not sure if its was meant to indicate Buy.Com. Since the big change in 2000, the logo has undergone some minor changes especially in the area of the tag lines such as

 - Lowest Prices on Earth
 - It's All Good
 - The Internet Superstore

The ABN AMRO name is derived from the initials ABN (Algemene Bank Nederland) and AMRO (Amsterdam-Rotterdam Bank), the founding banks of ABN AMRO in 1991. When and where was ABN AMRO founded?  ABN AMRO was created by the merger between ABN Bank and Amro Bank on 22 September 1991 in Amsterdam. The date of incorporation of bank is 29 March 1824 in the Hague.

The current logo, typography and typeface was designed by Landor Associates. The shield symbolises reliability, tradition, protection and security, the colour combination green (turquoise), yellow and grey sets it apart from logos of predecessors and rivals while at the same time being very modern, distinguished and clear.

Amazon.com is a pioneer in the online retailing business. The company was founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994 and began as an online book store. However today Amazon sells anything and everything under the sun including CDS, DVD, Baby Products, Furniture, electronics, clothes etc. You could say that they sell everything from "A to Z".

The Amazon logo represents the very same message that they sell everything from A to Z and the arrow below the logo represents the smile that customers would experience by shopping on the Amazon.com website.