In September 2017, an article appeared on Medium, in which the software developer Phil Wilson outed as one of three responsible designers of the Bitcoin logo. In addition to detailed instructions on how to reproduce the logo with MS Paint, Wilson also explains the symbolism surrounding the BTC logo. What is behind the world famous cryptocurrency symbol?
The most important thing in advance: Bitcoin is neither a protected name nor a protected trademark. What’s good for an open source project like Bitcoin and inviting everyone to take part in it can be detrimental here and there. An example of this is the takeover of Bitcoin.com by BCH evangelists around Roger Ver.
However, the fact that you do not always have to protect brands and symbols is shown by the fact that the Bitcoin community apparently agreed on a BTC logo all by itself. Namely the following:
The iconic white B with the currency symbols typical vertical strokes on an orange background has established itself as a convention. This could be because of the fact that there is a detailed guide on how everyone can make their own Bitcoin logo on their home computer. Open Source as it stands in the book. The manual is quite extensive, who actually wants to put this project into action, the article in the original by Phil Wilson is recommended.
Logo Full of Symbolism
In addition to said instructions, the article recalls the symbolism inherent in the logo. For example, the skew of the Bitcoin-B is no coincidence: the “B” in the logo has a special meaning.
The number 8 looks quite similar to this, Wilson thought. An eighth is 12.5 percent. If you add 12.5 percent infinitely to yourself and divide each summand around the divisor 10, you get around 14. Now, guess how many degrees the Bitcoin B was rotated on the logo. Right, exactly 14 degrees.
That the two vertical bars, the representation of the Bitcoin, are not continuous but were placed only on the edges of the Bs, is by no means a coincidence. With that, Wilson wanted to symbolically wipe out the US dollar — the world reserve currency. Because it affects the viewer as if the Bitcoin-B had been placed over the dollar-S, so displaced. The desired paradigm shift thus suggests itself in the Bitcoin logo.
“I wanted the symbol to represent the current global currency standard — the US dollar — which was replaced by Bitcoin,”
the designer writes in the post.
Why Orange?
The background of the logo is orange. One suspects: Again, the graphic artists had something specific in mind. To allow users to print the logo as well as use it online, Wilson and his co-workers had to define the color background in CMYK values. These are standard for pressure equipment. Coined (pun intended) on CMYK, the Bitcoin orange is obtained at values of C: 0 percent, M: 50 percent, Y: 100 percent, K: 0 percent.
It had to be a CMYK value that is easy to memorize. So everyone can conjure in no time the BTC orange. 0, 50, 100, 0.
The fact that the choice fell properly on orange, however, is rather arbitrary. It looked beautiful and unfolds a certain signal effect, the deeper message one seeks in vain.
The situation is different with the size of the orange circle in the background. You have to increase this by 525 percent so that it is scaled correctly. Why 525 percent? Because 12.5 (1/8) multiplied by 42 equals 525. Is it logical right? By the way, 42 is the answer to all questions about life, the universe and all the rest.
