The Portland Pattern Repository logo was installed and announced April 3, 1995. The original rubber stamp artwork was scanned, decimated and dithered so as to minimize image transmission time over our then 14.4 kb network connection. The announcement was caught by the internet archive ...
Apr 3, 1995 We have a new logo. Titled Paths of Change, this original work was executed in rubber stamp, an appropriate medium for a pattern repository.
The original scan was shrunk some more and redithered to make the logo used by this wiki, the now primary component of the repository. It is my wish that the logo be used only to identify content on this site.
Lorenzo Gatti's work
Lorenzo Gatti was kind enough to polish up the logo of this site for me. He didn't realize the original was intentionally imperfect. Still, I am thankful for his efforts and offer his work for viewing here...
http://c2.com/wiki/MoreAboutTheLogo/ppr-smoothed.gif
I'd be happy to host a gallery of variations if others would like to try their hand at stylizing this image.
The original of the image
The original is a scan of an image I made with a set of stamps my children played with at the time. The icon is intended to be symbolic ...
the stamp itself -- patterns
the alignment -- work by hand
the fading scan -- impermanence of that work
the dithering -- our work's rendering by computer
I was reading about the Japanese Zen aesthetics (Wabi Sabi) when I made the icon. That influenced both wiki-wiki and the icon I designed for it.
Legal Notice
Legal notice: I have not protected the image by trademark or copyright. However, it is my wish that it not be used publicly except on this site. Thank you. -- Ward Cunningham
For trademark info, see www.uspto.gov 
the following FAQ seems reasonable as well: www.ggmark.com
Usage creates a trademark. By using the logo, you have in essence trademarked it. See the woman suing Trump for the phrase "You're Fired!". She is a pottery maker who has been using "You're fired" for years in Illinois. Great pun. Also a great endrun around Trump. He cannot use "You're Fired!" in Illinois, as her previous usage reserves the phrase as HER trademark.
Yes, but trademarks are for goods/products; is Ward's image being used with a product? (Similarly, service marks are used with services)
Ward, since the logo is your creative work I believe you will find that you do indeed hold the legal copyright to it, even if you never officially registered it. -- Preston Rickwood
The copyright to the image, yes, under the Berne Convention, which is a different matter than use as a trademark.
Wrong: Hi! Just put the Logo in a cover, and Snail-Mail it, Registered Mail, to yourself. [paragraph deleted]
No, absolutely not, that is an urban legend.
As a print-maker myself, I must interject that use of the stamp does not confer copyright. I think it works a little differently in the US, but in Canada the designer would hold the copyright on the image, and the manufacturer would hold the copyright on the stamp (artifact) itself, unless they contracted otherwise. Mind you, I suspect the designer, if she/he knows about its use here, would be thrilled to see their little offering being put to such good use! -- Deborah Hartmann
In any country that is signatory to the Berne convention, including both the U.S. and Canada, simple creation of an artistic work is sufficient to give copyright to the creator. This is completely unrelated to any question of who may own a physical artifact of any sort. In general, in most countries, that would simply depend on the terms of the contract with the manufacturer, so always read the fine print.
Script applied to Lorenzo's image
Here is a script applied to Lorenzo's image in four (then two) quadrant rotations. Refresh your browser for alternatives. c2.com
http://c2.com/cgi/tile?i=/wiki/ppr/&n=4&r=112 c2.com HEIGHT 400
Awesome! Can I see it with the color icons too? Sure, though I can't figure out an easy way to make the colors match with more than two tiles.
http://c2.com/cgi/tile?i=/wiki/ppr/color/&n=2&r=112 c2.com HEIGHT 400
Variations by David Wall
I noticed that the tile was made up of four pieces, so I separated them, created some variations, and then wrote a little Perl program to randomly combine them, using user-specified weights. You can see the results at ylatis.com if you're interested. -- David Wall
I love it. -- Ward Cunningham
Reminds me of this book:
www.slate.com
YOUTUBE m9joBLOZVEo Published Jul 23, 2011.
See original on c2.com