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Christmas and Santa are religious (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas/) and I DON'T CELEBRATE false pagan holidays and don't want to see rubbish on my PCs. No asking me if I celebrate Christmas, simply shoving Christmas nonsense down our throats. If you think Santa and Christmas ("Christ's mass") is NOT religious, your retarded.

Please remove the Santa Hat icon immediately!

It's annoyed me so much I created a VideoLAN account just so that I could complain about it.

Why must I look at something I despise without being given an option?

Brad Smith

Please search the forum, before asking a common question.
Use VLC 1.2 (or newer) and deactivate the option to show the Santa Hat.

Noone is shoving anything in your throat: VLC is done by volunteers, on their free time, and VLC costs you absolutely nothing. If you don't like VLC, fork it or don't use it.

I don't have a strong religious opinion... frankly I just thought it was silly looking, and perhaps when switching between apps, it made it harder to find the icon I was accustomed to.
Regardless of the reasoning behind it, this was just change for change's sake...


Anyway - what a horrible attitude. Fork it or else? Really. Like a little five year old throwing a tantrum, JBK. It's software that makes it very easy to update - but not so easy for normal users to go track down older versions or the much newer ones with this new option. Kind of selfish of you to force people to go through that effort just to avoid an icon. I'm not ungrateful that VLC exists, but let's not kid ourselves that everyone has the capability of pulling code down and knowing what to change to recompile it to get around this. So for most people, your statement there really means: we've created one of the best multimedia software players in the world, please do not use it - we worked really hard to make it awesome, now go use Windows Media Player instead, if you're atheist/Muslim/a Christian that disagrees with the commercialization of your religion/Jehovah's Witness/etc.

It's a bad attitude. That makes me wonder if the icon was added (when, in 2009 I think?) to see if you'd piss anyone off, on purpose. People like using this software! People have good will towards you and the VLC team! You might think it's a silly hat meant in good fun, but to some it's a poke in the eye.

Edit:
P.S. Thank you for adding the option, at least.

Kind of selfish of you ...

I stopped reading there...
Seriously? I spend all my free time working on a project and I do probably more time and put more profesionnalism on VLC than most people on their own job. And I have one job too.
Calling me selfish? Screw you. What are you doing for other people?

Jean-Baptiste, you shouldn't even bother to answer people like this.
Against stupidity, the gods themselves contempt in vain! (F. Schiller)

Since nobody pays for VLC, the developers can do what they want, it is their's

Against stupidity, the gods themselves contempt in vain! (F. Schiller)

Hey, I like that one!

Santa Hat is back!!! yah!

I was honesly kinda sad when I hadn't seen it yet and I thought you guys pulled it out because people were whinning about it.

I'm not religious at.. but still love the hat. To me, it just shows winter has arrived.

I know everyone is busy, but maybe at some point you could do a Cone image Modification mod for most important world events for each of the developers? Maybe a Russia Day Cone for the Russian Developers, or maybe a Bastille Day type cone for the french. Its an idea that I think would show the massive amount of diversity, and talent that has made VLC what it is today. If you mouse over the cone, it would pop up a box with the names of folks who are from that country who helped develop for VLC and a small note about what is so special about that day. anyway, just an idea.

Please search the forum...
Use VLC 1.2 and deactivate the option.

Or even use Google. I've never understood people who immediately go crazy whenever the least simple thing upsets them. Research it a bit folks.

Jean-Baptiste, I agree with others that you just need to ignore these posts. I'm amazed the subject it comes up year after year (something I learned using Google -- it really is that easy people).

And anyone who doesn't like the hat, then volunteer to write the code to insert into VLC that would allow a user to use multiple icons that you could assign to display on certain dates, or a range of dates. The cone could wear a party hat on your birthday, display other holiday symbols, or even display a wedding ring tossed over the cone to remind you of your upcoming wedding anniversary (so you'd remember to get a gift for your spouse and not end up sleeping on the sofa).

Complainers, at the moment the ability to turn off the hat is available. If you want more, then code it yourself. Or better yet, code it for everyone else to use.

If a person is busy, they must stop everything to fix something that should be broken? Now I must search through obscure settings and research something I didn't ask for or want? Wasn't like that when I installed it.

Bad call. One thing if it displayed once or immediately allowed you to disable it.

Why not have icons for halloween and muslim holidays, etc. too?

Makes just as much sense.

something I didn't ask for or want? .

If you don't want VLC, don't use it.

I want VLC, don't want Santa crap all over my PC.

As said before, it can be turned off in the preferences.

Looked everywhere at the time, couldn't find the setting. Not sure if they added it afterward.

You know where the current setting is, in case Santa strikes again?

Looked everywhere at the time, couldn't find the setting. Not sure if they added it afterward.

You know where the current setting is, in case Santa strikes again?

Go: Tools > Preferences > Show settings (in the lower left corner) > click "All" > Go to "Interface > Main interfaces > Qt > scroll down > Untick "Allow automatic icon changes" > hit "Save"

DONE

BlackWhiteX

Thanks BlackWhiteX.

It is best to ignore those rude posts because people have a choice to tun off the santa hat in the preferences.
Surely, we can't all like the same things but a little respect goes a long way.

Where is my Santa hat? I have automatic icon changes enabled in prefs.

VLC 2.1.2
OS X 10.8.5

Btw God or Santa do not exist but I still like Christmas. Because it's very dark outside (Sweden) and it's nice with candles, family, good food etc. No need to believe in supernatural creatures to like that. Religion doesn't have monopoly on holidays.

You need to wait a few days.

You need to wait a few days.

...when is it scheduled to start? (& end?)

Also, I like the Santa Hat...

• Despite all the naysayers in this topic!...that like to claim it's "religious" or other crap...no, it's not, it's just funny/cool!
  
  Santa is not God, God is God, so a "VLC Jesus cone" would be religious, but Santa is not religious!
  
  Christmas, however, is religious, since it's about "Christ".

...I'd like it to be Christmas all year long...can I turn it on permanently?

Where is the Santa Hat cone image?...(the real one that VLC uses)...is it embedded somewhere in vlc.exe?...can it be extracted?...should I go dig in the source code for the already-extracted image?

Speaking of which, I don't actually like the color Orange (makes sense for a traffic cone tho!), so I want to get the REAL VLC cone image (the one VLC really uses, not just the copy from "lua\http\images", that's meant for the http interface script). I want the real, full size, default & Santa Hat cone images, so I can change the hue into Blue & Purple. I think Blue & Purple cones would look awesome.

I've also been meaning to ask: why on earth is this page Orange (ick!)...

• videolan.org/vlc

...but this is a nice Blue (yay!)...

• videolan.org

...I think the site should go Blue all-around.

LOL, I found at least one Santa Hat image (on the homepage right now)...

• images.videolan.org/images/goodies/cone-eT5x.png

It's the 19th and still no Santa hat on my VLC. I'm using 2.1.2 on Win7. I checked the Qt setting under interface and there is no reference to allowing automatic icon changes or otherwise. Is the Santa hat no more?

How could we drop our beloved santa hat cone? It is up now.

Hey! I just noticed the cute li'l Santa hat! Don't remember seeing that in years past, but I love it! (Shame the OP on this thread felt the opposite)
Are there other times of the year when this sorta thing happens, and I've just missed it?
And how is it done? I'm a dumb-ass when it comes to computer programming, but I seem to recall terms like "client side" & "server side."

Thanks to the devs for the Santa hat icon, love it.

And Merry Christmas!

I'm about to start playing Christmas music through my stereo, and I just saw the Santa hat! Awesome!!

Besides being free and a really good application, that just shows how much the developers love us.

Thanks for everything guys!