The term Gotchi was coined in 2006 by Philip Pocock and the SpacePlace :: Art in the Age of Orbitization team. Gotchi is inspired aesthetically by the member icons on several Linux Planets, such as Planet Gnome and Planet Suse, and the term itself is extracted from the composite noun Hackergotchi which itself is etymologically derived from the game name Tamagotchi.
A Gotchi is an icon, a cut-out or detail, with or without a drop shadow, of a photograph, painting, illustration, or animation still. As cut-outs, Gotchis are most of the time set off against transparent backgrounds. A standard Gotchi depicts a individual's (or creature's) head. Sometimes, yet seldomly, a Gotchi may depict more than an individual's head, usually then including a hand or hands, a full body or an inanimate cut-out form framing an individual's head. Aesthetically, Gotchis as cut-outs seem, on the one hand, flat and 2-D in appearance. Yet, on the other hand, their being primarily photographic and often with a drop shadow, they tend to appear more than 2-D, approaching 3-D. There is no reason why inanimate objects are not potential Gotchi subjects. However, the ultimate goal of Gotchi-makers is to collect Gotchis for all 6 billion plus human beings on the planet. SpacePlace is an Internet art platform that makes noticable, aesthetic and navigational use of Gotchis.
