Read the FAQ, still +1 for Dispatch.
Fair point to raise. I did see the “Dispatch” walkie-talkie idea in the old thread, but I deliberately treated this poll as a shortlist of the more serious creature/animal-like mascot proposals.
I dunno, they seem like a good creature to me. “Serious” or otherwise = ]
Cute pun, but to me a walkie-talkie still feels more like a single-dispatch device with extra knobs than a true multiple-dispatch mascot.
I WANT ONE. NOW.
(Why should biologists have all the fun?)
let’s just say I’m a little surprised that passed the AI’s safety features on lewd content 
Here is my apology for Dispatch:
So, working with @Wikunia and with permission from @miguelraz, we included Dispatch as the unofficial mascot in our JuliaCon talk here:
This video has been viewed close to \approx 10K times, I believe Miguel has plushies of Dispatch floating around somewhere, and people beyond these forums loved the little walkie-talkie. I believe in terms of an unofficial mascot, Dispatch is it! 
Plus, in terms of recognition, I feel Dispatch is pretty recognizable, easy to draw, somewhat accessible (at least in terms of contrast, colors can be made more accessible), and has a lot of personality. So for me, I will always think of Dispatch as the unofficial mascot.
They have a special place in my heart and plus, they were made with heart and by hand – human hands. So, in defense of the fantastical and adorable little sentient walkie-talkie creature known as Dispatch, I state my case! 
Is it possible to buy one?
Generally, whatever mascot the community comes up with, the most important part should be making a plush version available.
That’s kind of the whole point of a mascot.
Yes, but what again could be a more single dispatch gadget than a walkie-talkie, which suggests a pretty simple communication model … is that Julia? 
The way to a different mascot — if you’re so inclined — would be to do exactly as Raz did. Make something compelling, share it around, and get others excited about it.
This isn’t a zero-sum game. It’s unofficial; you don’t need permission or community support at all. There can be more than one. You even can freely use and remix the Julia logo itself under the terms of the CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
Just as a practical note: I plan to close the poll after about a week in total.
Have a nice weekend.
This is a very cool one (not for a mascot because I’m not in favor of any) but a bit too complex with all those barely visible shadows bordering the gray thick lines.
If you voted “No, a serious candidate is missing”, please mention it in the replies.
I read the thread. I liked the dispatch walkie talkie and the lambda with the three dots. If the lower dots are stylized as eyes, then you have a face, and now you can relate to the lambda. I like them as visual puns.
The Julia fractal is nice, but its pointiness seems somewhat unwieldy, and the aforementioned candidates seem easier to work with.
Mantis Shrimp / Mantissa is a nice pun. I also like the Dragonfly / Julia Skimmer and Butterfly / Julia heliconian.
Isn’t the red panda taken up by Mozilla / Firefox?
I feel that the axolotl and hummingbird are somewhat generic.
Indeed, Ferris is a good example, but is also a good demonstration of how mascots emerge. My understanding is that Karen Rustad Tölva just drew it and people picked it up. Now it has fan art and plush toys to buy and design patterns if you want to make your own Ferris hat or plushie or whatever. You can buy mugs, wine glasses, T-shirts, all kinds of merch.
I hope that someday a talented artist will just make something similar for Julia. IMO the best way to start is to make something simple and cute. Simple so that people can draw it themselves, or make a plushie, or do what they like with it. Cute because cute critters just get more publicity — this is unfair to, say, slugs, but that’s how it works.
Of the candidates, I would only call the axolotl simple & cute, or at least potentially cute (at least I have seen plush toys of a species in the Postojna caves gift shop). The mantis shrimp, the dragonfly, the butterfly, and the hummingbird are quite complex as drawings or plush toys, but perhaps I am wrong and they can be made simple & cute. The Julyax could work since it is imaginary, if it can be simplified.
I did not vote because I believe that if we ever arrive at a mascot, it will just happen, someone will make it and it will be picked up. My advice would be to keep it simple and cute. Everyone with a bit of determination should be able to draw one, or make a plush or a papier-mâché version.
I think that these AI-generated images are just missing the point. Yes, you can make something very elaborate using AI, and even defy the laws of physics (eg if it was a plush toy, the legs would not support the body to lift the underbelly so much).
But in practice, making something so elaborate in a small run would probably cost way above 100€ (just for reference, the Ferris plush toy is 32€). No one would just sketch something like this during a boring meeting, or make a hat or a sock puppet out of love for the language or the community.
That’s why I said that this problem is waiting for someone with creative talent, who can make something simple and engaging. I understand that people want a mascot, but dicking around with AI is not the way to get it. At least that’s not how existing mascots came about.
Look at Tux, the other well-known mascot. A few simple lines gets you there. Even I could probably draw a simple but recognizable Tux with a bit of practice, and I am hopeless at drawing.
I think you are optimizing too hard for manufacturability.
A mascot is not only a plush-toy specification. It is also a symbolic figure for a community. So “can it be made cheaply” is relevant, but it is not the master criterion.
AI ideation is also a red herring. Nobody is obliged to treat AI output as the final design. It is perfectly legitimate as part of early exploration. What matters is the final concept, not whether one sketch came from a notebook, Procreate, or a generator.
And I do not buy the idea that a mascot must be ultra-simple to work. It needs a recognizable core, yes. But beyond that, distinctiveness matters. A mantis shrimp is interesting precisely because it is unusual, vivid, and full of character. That is a strength, not a weakness.
So the real question is not “is it simple enough to doodle in 10 seconds?” but “does it give Julia a memorable identity?” Those are not the same thing.
Closing time is near
The polling will close around 2026-04-30T07:00:00Z, so cast your votes now, if you have not done so already.
) could be made into a cute plush toy. It would just need the usual plush-toy treatment: simplify, soften, and keep the distinctive features.