With the 2022 World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit into the countdown, Xiaohu, the mascot of the World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit, can be seen everywhere in Wuzhen. It has a round head with a "tentacle", and the logo of the summit is painted on its body.

As a mascot, "Xiaohu" contains many Internet and Wuzhen elements: the colorful logo of the World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit, a mouse cursor arrow, a computer monitor, the Grand Canal, Jiangnan water town, Internet culture, an intelligent robot, high-precision eye mask, innovation blue, metal gray...

"Li Jianluang, a visual designer from Xiamen, Fujian, who has worked in Zhejiang for many years, started to work on the design of the mascot after seeing the call for entries online last year. "The image of 'Xiaohu' is mainly inspired by the core Internet elements of the conference." He said that the first thing that came to his mind was the appearance of the Jiangnan water town, associated with the logo of the World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit, which is shaped like the Chinese word "Hu", thinking outside the box to design a round-headed robot image that can interact with people, and then incorporated the mouse cursor arrow. "After continuous modification and improvement, it took a week to draw seven or eight versions of different styles of sketches before finally forming the image of "Xiaohu".

The successful selection of "Xiaohu" as the mascot was the result of many layers of selection. In August last year, the organizing committee went through a global call for entries, repeatedly screening 24 designs from the preliminary shortlist, and then organizing an expert jury to review them before "Xiaohu" stood out among the competitors.

Cheng Zhaohui, vice president of the School of Design and Art of China Academy of Art, was one of the judges. He favored "XiaoHu", as the design concept of "XiaoHu" fully reflected its characteristics from the Internet, which is cute and fresh. "The overall image takes a circle as the basic form, which represents global interconnection, but is also concise and contemporary. The lively and cute expression reflects the conference's focus on the latest Internet development trends and cutting-edge technology dynamics."

In order to make the image of "Little Mutual" more impressive, in March this year, the "Xiaohu" image authorization unit was specially set up by the General Assembly Cultural and Creative Division, the team gathered many new designers to carry out in-depth integrated operation around the IP culture mining and the incubation of "XiaoHu" IP. At present, we have developed four kinds of products based on the prototype of "Xiaohu", including notebooks, bookmarks, handicrafts, plush toys, badges, wireless headphones, rechargeable batteries, canvas bags, sweatshirts, pillows, mugs, and so on.

In August, the mascot "Xiaohu" digital collection also debuted on the meta-universe "Yuan Su" platform, the global limited edition of 2,000 copies of "Xiaohu" is almost out of seconds. Yang Jianwei, the marketing director of the mascot image licensing company, said that hoping to get more young people to pay attention to the World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit through the creation of the mascot image and IP incubation.

In this year's Light of Internet Expo, this cute mascot will have its own booth, so don't miss this opportunity if you want to meet with "XiaoHu". During the conference, you can also have a chance encounter with "XiaoHu" at the expo site, bus stops, high-speed railway arrivals, etc. For those who want "XiaoHu" peripheral products, you can buy them offline at the expo site, electronic digital exhibition, Wuzhen West Gate, post office, etc. You can also search for "Xiaohu Zhenxuan" in the WeChat app for online purchases.

Translator: Qian Yingchao (Intern)

Editor: Ye Ke, Qian Yingchao (Intern)