Is the Google Android logo 'stolen'?

[JohnDroid]

Engadget just broke a news story about how it 'appears' that Google may have misappropriated some artwork from an old Atary Lynx game (kudos if you had one back in the day, I did). The game in question is 'Gauntlet: The Third Encounter' and as you might have guessed features an Android shaped very similar to the Android robot that we know.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that there are only so many million permutations of what the human typically envisions when they picture an "Android" in their head. Eventually, somewhere, your going to find that likeness on multiple products. I think it's going to be a stretch for conspiracy theorists to really believe that this icon is ripped from Atari's long forgotten arcade collection.

What are your thoughts?

(Source: Engadget)

 

[Abe21599]

well tehn i say apple did the same thing

 

[JohnDroid]

well tehn i say apple did the same thing

Yah, about the same differences

 

[icculusX]

Haha... I was just cleaning my attic and found a bunch of atari controllers and games. Oh boy the memories! That is kind of funny tho...

 

[JohnDroid]

I used to play the crap out of this game

[video=youtube;ql2S-wXa-H8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql2S-wXa-H8]YouTube - Atari Lynx - California Games "Surfing" [Epyx] 1991[/video]

 

[Mojo]

There is some resemblances to it... but the old atari android is based off an 8 sided polygon type shape. The Google android logo is not. Very different features in the too

 

[TommyGun]

Mistaken Identity

Ridiculous to think this is where todays Android came from. Plus theirs is Spongedroid Roundpants and ours is the real Spongedroid SQUAREpants. See the difference

 

[droider4life]

did you hear "oakley" stole their logo idea from the alphabet?!?!?!?!?! :icon_ poke::rofl3::rofl3::rofl3::rofl3:

btw: i totally just made that up.

 

[amn70]

One could argue that this little Atari character looks conspicuously like R2D2. Lucasfilm could have made that argument back then that Atari stole R2's likeness. If anything the Droid character resembles R2 more and the use of the word Droid is licensed to Verizon by Lucas Verizon so the Droid character resembling R2 a bit isn't completely out of bounds.

 

[nagmier]

Way for EnGadget to STREEEEETCH for a story... Has anyone else noticed they suck... BAD sometimes they just pull completely random things outta nowhere don't bother fact checking and running with it... As pointed out earlier they are nothing alike at least not any more than the apple/apple

 

[*22899]

I used to play the crap out of this game

YouTube - Atari Lynx - California Games "Surfing" [Epyx] 1991

Its been so long I forgot about that game. I used to play it till I would fall asleep!!! In 1991 I was 11!!

That oakley comment was awesome also!

 

[Crypt92]

i guess engadget is afraid to bash on apples new "revolutionary" itunes logo cause the Apple Police will find them or how their old logo used to have a rainbows for their gay pride? An article would be more intriguing if it was about remember that apple logo used to be a rainbow well now Steve Jobs came out of the closet. What a pointless article to make out.

 

[DF Smod]

Close, but no cigar...and Abe, great post

 

[RW-1]

Pointless indeed.

The question they really missed is Who cares?

Move along people, New Roms out, move along .....

 

[fish1552]

Well, the have to post something to get people riled up and posting to their website.