The doItLater “dil” handsign

I thought I’d take a minute to explain the doItLater handsign for those who are confused by it.

On doItLater.com,  the main logo is a hand-sign and so is the favicon (little picture next to the web address in your browser).  Some people just thought it was the “perfect” symbol.  Now, while they are correct in assuming that the site is, in fact, perfect – that’s not the meaning of our particular logo.

It’s not ASL or anything fancy like that… turns out it’s actually pretty simple: the fingers spell out “dil”: an abbreviation for “do it later”.  If the letters don’t jump out at you right away, it’s probably just easier to show you than to try to describe it… check it out:

Pretty shnazzy, huh?

A meme of its own

The dil handsign has started popping up in pictures.  I have a feeling it will be in a larger and larger number of the images that people submit to the site.  To keep an eye on this budding internet meme, check out the items tagged with “dil”.  If you’re out and about and you see something cool and want to take a picture with it, throwing out a “dil” sign is about the best way to make sure that your picture gets some attention on the site.

But it’s backwards!

We hear this one a lot.  It’s apparently really confusing for some people to remember their lefts and rights when it comes to the dil handsign.  Heck, I even have to double-check myself and I’m pretty sure that’s my hand in the logo (but I don’t remember, it could have been the Graphic Designer‘s hand).  Nonetheless, we like to make fun of people when they screw up and make them think that they’re the only one on the planet with trouble figuring this one out.  When you do the sign backwards it would spell “lib”, so we also have a “lib” tag with which to ridicule the unfortunate submitters who don’t remember to flip their picture before submitting it if they messed up in the wild.  As I’m writing this we don’t have any “lib” items yet, but I’m sure we’ll get plenty over time.

Quick tutorial: if you want to use your left hand, point your palm towards the other person/camera.   If you want to use your right hand, just throw the sign across your chest so the outside of your hand is showing.  Check out this excelent example from a clearly-intelligent, strapping young lad.  Two years from now he’ll be bragging that he had the first dil-sign picture on doItLater.com and nobody will believe him.  So sad.

One final thought on the sign being backwards: maybe it’s not the sign that’s backwards… maybe your hand isn’t screwed on right.  Adjust accordingly.