I've got stickers on my laptops. None of them are political, but I've got various indie fashion brands, music related, furry stickers, etc. If someone managed to be offended by them that's more their problem than mine. I can go work anywhere and have enough savings that it would be no inconvenience to me. I wouldn't want to work with someone who couldn't handle some trivial self expression on the back of a laptop.

So far no one has ever been offended by this though. HN is far more sensitive than the average CTO.

> though perl might be offensive to some

Now I'm tempted to make a set of: Perl, COBOL, Java Beans, Java EE, ActiveX, Silverlight, VB.Net, ActiveDirectory, Kerberos, ...

> comfortable with displaying in front of a CxO without worry

In today's timeline, you'd need to be concerned about what some random TSA agent felt about your stickers and if that might get you pulled aside for additional screening.

That's why even though I like the weird and esoteric stickers you see here, I myself prefer the `unixstickers` style I think you're talking about. Debian, Arch, GNU, Python, bash, Ruby, Git, Vim, fork bomb, Tux, DEFCON, 127.0.0.1, &c. These are great for starting conversations, even in cafes. And you end up meeting some interesting people with shared culture.

Safe to have a perl sticker as while it’s easy enough to put it on, nobody (including yourself) be able to read it.

I have a bunch of stickers from hobbies like bikes and sim racing. I guess it serves a similar purpose!