Having just switched work laptops last December, I realized how much I love applying stickers to my work machines. Sometimes the stickers are souvenirs from past events, others are from projects that I am passionate about, and some are just for fun!
Curious to know what others had on their laptops, I asked!
Accessibility advocate
(AmyJune Hineline, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Here is my work laptop (Can you tell my roots are in Drupal). My favorite decal is the Druplicon with the wheelchair... When Drupal 8 came out, we took the logo and blended it with the wheelchair because the agency I worked with focused on accessibility.
Fresh Java
(Alan Formy-Duval, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I have always had stickers on my computers and stuff since I was a kid. I think my favorite is either Tux or the Linux Inside. They are mostly field-relevant except for just a few. In the bottom-right corner, I have Java running on Tomcat (haha) - an area I spent much of my career doing.
Utilitarian purpose
(Rikard Grossman-Nielsen, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Well, I don't have any stickers. However, I've glued Velcro bands on my two laptops to secure my external hard drive for when I'm gaming on the bus. I have also glued a lock notch on.
Maintain the look
( John 'Warthog9' Hawley, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Not the most decorated laptop by far, but I like the collection (and you know, hard to get more without travel for a while!)
My favorite is the "last one to commit is the maintainer". It's a snarky comment on the state of maintainership, as well as a promise that the code will live on as a result.
Mostly it boils down to things I use or contribute to, think are meaningful, or just found the sticker awesome.
Window covering
I never put stickers on my laptop because it seems to me the only really cool stickers are the ones I don't have (said the grumpy old man.)
But the old homebrew computer my kids used to use in high school, a 3GHz Core Duo with 8 GB of memory, has an Open Mainframe sticker on it that I grabbed at the Linux Foundation Open Source Summit here in Vancouver a few years ago. I quite like that one.
And because in my life, the Control key lives next to the A, not down on the bottom row, I have a few keyboards around with a CTRL sticker on the CapsLock key and a CAPS sticker on the Control key, which work together with the swap Ctrl and CapsLock option in GNOME Tweak Tool.
Finally, I used to peel off Windows stickers, back when my only option was buying computers and paying the Windows tax, and put Linux sticker over the gummy patch. Same with keyboards that had the Windows logo on the Super key.
Mementos
(Kristine Strange, CC BY-SA 4.0)
The Kanopi sticker is by far my favorite sticker. Not only is it shiny and iridescent, but it's a constant reminder of how amazing this company is to work for. They seriously put their employees first, and they're super mindful in selecting client projects that align with Kanopi's overall company mission and vision.
The Curt V8 sticker is in remembrance of a dear friend. He loved Fords and my husband loves Chevys. The constant fun rivalry resulted in randomly placed Ford and Chevy objects snuck into garages depending on whose house we were at. I smile every time I see this Ford emulated sticker on my laptop, since I live in a Chevy family.
The variety of stickers represents the family adventures that we have been on throughout the years. Date nights, friends, family road trips, scary hiking adventures (Angels Landing), and my youngest's drive to get a police sticker from every city and state.
Conference swag
(Cindy Williams, CC BY-SA 4.0)
The dragon is my college mascot. I also have some Gilmore Girls and coffee stickers.
Here’s a photo of my daughter’s door, filled with stickers I’ve brought back from conferences over the years.
(Cindy Williams, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Sticking with chicken
This is my not-work laptop. My work laptop is basically being covered in a honeycomb of hex-shaped stickers of our products, open source projects I use and support, and at least one Opensource.com hexagon. :)
I can’t pick a favorite, since they are all favorites, or I wouldn’t have them on the laptop that goes with me everywhere. I am overly fond of the chickens, the Raven, and Sergi the Cat with his knives.
(Kevin Sonney, CC BY-SA 4.0)
(Kevin Sonney, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Foodie fun
I used to load up my laptops with stickers. The one I bought last year filled up fast:
(DJ Billings, CC BY-SA 4.0)
My favorite is the cupcake & donut one because I illustrated it.
I just bought a System76 Darter Pro laptop and I love it. I got a bunch of really cool stickers with it, but I've been hesitant to put them on the laptop. I don't know why.
Keeping it clean
(Don Watkins, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I don’t put a lot of stickers on my laptops but I’ve got my two favorites on my current laptop, which is System76 Darter Pro.
Life's essentials
(Katie Sanders, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I included my water bottle, too. I think I like those stickers even more.
Beer, dogs, music, croissants. What else could I need in life?
My mantra
(Faye Polson, CC BY-SA 4.0)
My favorite sticker is yeet or be yeeted.
Garlic
(Tiffany Bridges, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Most of the stickers are professional, but the Greetings from Hamunaptra, City of the Dead sticker is a subtle reference to one of my favorite movies, The Mummy (1999) starring Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz.
The flags and the Blackbeard’s Bar & Grill stickers are references to Our Flag Means Death, which I am completely obsessed with.
And the garlic is the Cosmic Garlic sticker of my friend's shop. Garlic is a folk remedy for all kinds of diseases, so it seemed like a good thing to put on a laptop during a pandemic.
Open source projects
(Seth Kenlon, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I usually cover my laptop with projects I use, contribute to, or admire. Statistically, my laptop should be layered with a lot more stickers by now. I haven't been to a tech conference in three years, so the pace has been slower than usual.
Decked out in Drupal
(April Sides, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I add stickers that represent me in tech. So I include organizations I'm a part of, events I've attended, and projects I support.
It's always fun to see the Drupal bear on people’s laptops since I designed it.
Notice all of my stickers are on a laptop cover for preservability.
Wild about WordPress
(Michelle Frechette', CC BY-SA 4.0)
My favorite is hard to pick, but probably the Michelle wapuu! She’s so me!
The stickers I press all the words and WordPress is my super power are from WordCamp Rochester, so those are near and dear to me.
Basically, I’ll add a sticker if I have a history with it (I spoke at the camp, for example), or I just like it!
An eye for art
(Jonathan Daggerhart, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I heavily lean towards art stickers. Seeing art on my computer reminds me of the people I know and experiences I’ve had while using this computer.
My favorite is the sad-face Midsommar sticker that my partner gave me. After seeing the movie for the first time, we stood outside the theater discussing it for hours into the night. We still reference it to this day.
Custom skin
(Sallie Goetsch, CC BY-SA 4.0)
I got a new travel laptop in 2019, and it remains pristine because I have not been to any events since then. My work laptop has a custom skin of the goddess Ereshkigal, after whom I named the computer.
—Sallie Goetsch
GNU Emacs
(Sachin Patil, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Opensource.com
After seeing everyone's responses, and maybe getting some cool stickers in the mail from a very brilliant community manager...
OK, OK, I give! AmyJune, Don, and Sachin convinced me to put ONE sticker on my laptop.
Here's a photo showing my laptop with its singular sticker:
(Chris Hermansen, CC BY-SA 4.0)
—Chris Hermansen
Stickers and open source
You don't have to adorn your computer with stickers. It's not required, and it certainly doesn't mean you love open source more or less than anybody else. But if you love an open source project, there's a good chance that it's got a sticker you can use to decorate your computer (or your door, water bottle, or USB microphone). Rest assured that if you love open source and you love stickers, there's a strong intersection between the two!
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