Who Has The Best Holiday Logos?

Google and Yahoo! have for a long time customized their logos on numerous holidays throughout the year. This practice has been going on for years, and its hard to tell who was doing it first (Google's first "doodle" logo appeared in 1999, for Yahoo! that information is harder to come by -- if anyone knows when they first started modifying their logo for holidays, please chime in!). More recently, Ask got in on the act.

Today, being Thanksgiving (a major US holiday) is no different. All three have spruced up their logos in the celebratory spirit (they are the only members of the "big 5" search engines to do so). Presented below are the Thanksgiving day logos from Google, Yahoo! and Ask. [Correction: AOL also has a holiday logo, and the post has been updated to include it!] Which is your favorite? Which company consistently provides the best holiday logo modifications? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Google

Google's logos have for a long time been drawn by in-house graphic designer Dennis Hwang. Today, Hwang is in charge of all of Google's web masters, but designing logo doodles is still about 20% of his job. This year, Google takes a traditional approach with a couple of turkeys sitting down to a Thanksgiving meal (but, I wonder what they're eating?).

Yahoo!

For the past few years, Yahoo! has taken to using Flash to animate its holiday logos. That makes for some really fun results, and today is no exception. Their Thanksgiving logo includes a cornucopia spilling traditional holiday fare, and some food (corn, potatoes, pumpkin, pie) that is magically transformed into a group of happy dancers by a falling buckle hat. A bit odd? You bet, but it's a lot of fun, too.

Ask

Ask has always been sort of the odd man out, doing things their own way. Not content to modify their logo, they often modify their entire page. Today's page sports a background made of turkey (well, a very close up picture of a turkey). Honestly, it's a bit creepy -- I mean, really, whose turkey is that shiny in real life?

AOL

Thanks to reader Boris who pointed out that AOL does indeed have a holiday logo (I had only checked their search page -- whoops!). Presented below in all its plainness, AOL's holiday alteration is certainly the most "safe" on our list. A buckle hat and some fallen leaves. Cute, but hardly lighting the world on fire (or inspiring acid flashbacks, like one of the logos above -- wait, maybe that's a good thing).

Which is your favorite? Do you know of any other sites that decorate for the holidays? Let us know in the comments!