What Does EOS Stand For and What is the Logo?

Hello TrybeIANs! This bear makes is a bit of a downer so I thought I would write something light. I have been a big fan of crypto and blockchain and I can see the huge potential it has to offer! So, whenever I meet someone new, blockchain usually comes up in conversation. Inevitably Bitcoin will come up in the conversation and for the most part, most people I have talked to know or have heard about Bitcoin. I have come to realize that the “general population” see Bitcoin as a digital currency used by drug dealers, dark web, and used for kinds of illicit activity. I blame mainstream media for this but with some debate I manage to convince them otherwise. However, EOS is a different story, I think that 99.9% of the world doesn’t know what EOS is. A common question is what does EOS stand for? Is EOS an acronym for something? Good question! I remember the first time someone asked me this and I couldn’t provide an answer. So doing my own research I type a Google search “What does EOS stand for?” I think the top hit was this Reddit post(1) and in that post, some have suggested that EOS is an acronym for : Ethereum On Steroids Enterprise Operating System Everywhere Operating System Earth’s Operating System Economy Operating System   As you can see there is a common theme for the “OS” meaning Operating System. Just like MSDOS, MacOS, and iOS the “OS” means Operating System. The creator of EOS, Dan Larimer and Block.one, have said EOS is as an Operating System for a global computer. If you are reading this I am sure you use a computer and therefore you can think of the blockchain as “computer hardware” and EOS as the “operating system” and DApps (Decentralized Applications) are built on the EOS operating system. I see a future with many of the DApps run as Decentralized Autonomous Communities or DACs. You can read my Trybe post about DACs here. So to me, it does make sense the EOS stands for “blank” Operating System. However, the official website for EOS, EOS.IO had an FAQ on their site and Question #6 read: “What does EOS stand for?” And the answer from EOS.IO and Block.one was: “We believe that EOS means different things to different people. We have received numerous amazing interpretations of what EOS stands for or what it should stand for so we have decided not to formally define it ourselves.” So there you have it, the creators of EOS have left the meaning of EOS open to interpretation. But wait a minute…… I have since noticed that that question is no longer on their FAQ. Hmmm … interesting .? So is there a meaning behind the EOS a name?  EOS goddess of Dawn (credit) Well, it turns out EOS in Greek mythology is the name for the Greek Goddess of Dawn (2). And as you know, each morning dawn is the start of a new day. In Greek mythology, EOS the goddess of Dawn rose each morning from her home to bring light to mortals and immortals. Her tears are considered to have created the morning dew. EOS was also the mother of several famous offspring, including the Winds, Zephyrus, Boreas, and Notus, and the Morning Star, Eosphoros, so if you see any EOS.IO “progeny” (ie dApps) with these names you can bet that there is a back story to the EOS name. I personally like the idea of EOS as the goddess of Dawn. Another reason to believe that EOS was inspired by the Greek goddess of Dawn was that the EOS test net was called Dawn 1.0 (released on September 3, 2017). This was followed by test net versions Dawn 2.0 (released on December 4, 2017), Dawn 3.0 (released January 25, 2018) and Dawn 4.0 (released May 7, 2018). EOSIO’s main launch called “Dawn 1.0” was launched on the EOSIO mainnet on June 1, 2018. So, from this, I think it is more than coincidental that they used “Dawn” as the name for the EOSIO releases and EOS could be the the goddess of Dawn. So in my eyes the meaning of EOS is two fold: EOS it is really like goddess of “Dawn”, the one that begins the day and shines light on everyone, and you can think of EOS is the “E” Operating System and “E” is open to your interpretation. I personally like Earth’s Operating System as many EOS fans predict world adoption of EOS in the near future. So what doe the EOS Logo mean? image credit The EOS logo is a seven-sided object (a heptahedron) and is known as the Chestahedron. The Chestahedron was named after artist and geometrician Frank Chester (3), and is constructed with 4 equilateral triangles and 3 “kite” shapes, the amazing part of this object is that each triangle and kite shape have the same area. The Chestahedron also resembles the left ventricle of the human heart. Since the major organ of the chest is the heart, it is aptly named the Chestahedron. Here is a short video of Dan Larimer speaking about the Chestahedron EOS logo:   Dan says “EOS is the blockchain with a heart” and just like our heart is essential for life the …“blockchain should serve people”. The EOS brand was also inspired by the Fibonacci Sequence. In mathematics, the Fibonacci sequence is derived by the fact that every number after the first two is the sum of the two preceding ones: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21… The Fibonacci sequence (or sometimes referred to as the golden ratio) is mathematical sequence that is found throughout nature (for example the Nautilus shell). There hints of the Fibonacci sequence on the EOS.IO website for example their “Scalable” icon which is said to be “organic, infinite, flexible”: image created by me with wiki commons media But the Chesterhedron really stands out as the logo that people associate EOS with. Brendnan Blumer, CEO of Block.one, has said “It is the heart of our blockchain” Here is a short video from Block.one describing the The Story of the EOSIO Brand and how the Chestahedron and the Fibonacci Sequence helped shape their look:   Wait there’s more! I love tinkering and building things.  So I found a site where you can download the plans to build your own 3 dimensional EOS logo and it is really easy and fast( 10 min.) and fun to make. Here are some pics of my build (I plan to build a better one with thicker paper):     Looks cool on my levitation lamp: Here is what it can look like if you make it with heavier paper: image credit So take some time away from your computer, spend some time with your kids, family, pets, and friends and download the template and build yourself your very own 3D EOS Chestahedron logo! Cheers! Ian References: (1) Reddit post:  https://www.reddit.com/r/eos/comments/78f0e6/what_does_eos_stand_for/ (2) Wikipedia entry for EOS goddess: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eos (3) Frank Chester’s website: http://www.frankchester.com/sculpture/chestahedron/ (4) Everipedia entry for EOS:  https://everipedia.org/wiki/lang_en/eos-cryptocurrency/ (5) Build your own Chestahedron: http://www.frankchester.com/2012/make-your-own-chestahedron-template/ (6) Everipedia entry for Fibonacci number: https://everipedia.org/wiki/lang_en/Fibonacci_number/ (7) EOS logo used in title: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxGOciW2w4c Loading...