Using initials for missing avatars instead of gravatar

[brendanheywood]

Another quick toy idea I've wanted to try out for a while, I've seen this in a couple other places like Trello.

For people who don't have an avatar, how about instead we choose a random color which is locked to their account, and then overlay their initials on top. A couple mockups:

Pros:

• less clutter in the design
• more useful recognition in places like forums of who said what
• lighter page weight

Cons:

• potential clash with sponsor border. This can be mitigated by only choosing fairly muted low saturation colours. I've also got a few ideas for making the sponsors avatars simpler and cleaner too, like making it a little square badge inside the corner of the avatar. This is also so we can stack badges, ie 'sponsor' + 'admin' or 'sponsor' + 'area coordinator'

[scd]

I definitely think this is worth while looking into further as it is much clearer then the default gravitars. However I think you are right about the potential clash with sponsor stuff.

Make this issue a dependency of reworking the sponsor avatar.

[brendanheywood]

Clsoing this as won't do, it may clash with the badges / supports stuff #2350