Zoich

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Zoich (Cyrillic: Зойч, pronounced [zojtɕ]) was a proposed mascot for the XXII Winter Olympics from the official online poll to select a mascot for the 2014 Sochi games. Throughout the online voting, it was the most popular mascot from those submitted. It took around 40 minutes for Zoich to be voted to the top spot.^[1] The committee decided not to introduce it to the final round of the voting.

Zoich can be considered example of guerrilla marketing, as the artist was commissioned by the 2014 Olympic Committee to create a mascot which would serve as a promotion for the competition. In a June 2011 statement from the president of Sochi 2014 Olympic and Paralympic Organizing Committee, it was revealed that Zoich was not a genuine independent entry into the competition.^[2][3]

In September 1, 2010, The Organizing Committee of the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, in conjunction with the newspaper Izvestia, announced an open online competition to select the mascots for the 2014 games. The competition received 24,048 entries from across Russia and Russians abroad. On September 10, 2010, Moscow artist and designer Yegor Zhgun entered with an original sketch of an imaginary frog, naming it "Zoich". According to its author, the idea of Zoich was influenced by the character Hypnotoad from the show Futurama.^[1]

Zoich is a fuzzy blue frog. The Olympic Rings rotate in its eyes, taking the role of pupils: black, yellow, and blue in the right eye and red and green in the left. In its mouth, the frog holds a ski pole and a Russian Imperial Crown sits atop its head. The mascot takes its name from the year "2014" as it is represented on the Olympiad's logo: The numbers 2, 0, and 1 as they are represented look like the Latin Z, O, and I. The number 4 looks like the Russian letter Ч, which is like the English "ch".^[4] Many Russian-speaking people read "2014" as "Zoich" upon presentation of Sochi-2014 logo. Zhgun's description of his mascot: "The Olympic Rings in his eyes spell the progress of Olympic ideals; the tsars’ crown on his head recalls authority and faith."

After Zhgun posted an animated clip ^[1] of his mascot on YouTube on November 8, 2010, showing Zoich in motion, the press dubbed the mascot "Hypnotoad", referencing its obvious resemblance to the character Hypnotoad from American animated TV series Futurama.^[5] In July 2011, Futurama referenced the influence of the Hypnotoad on Zoich in the opening sequence of the episode "All the Presidents' Heads". The 20th episode of the show's sixth season, shows a brief clip from Zhgun's original Zoich animated clip mounted on a television screen.

The registration of intellectual rights to Zoich, by the Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee, was revealed on June 14, 2011. The idea that Zoich was not a legitimate independent entry to the competition was deemed so far-fetched that it required statements from the Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee and Zhgun to convince journalists of its legitimacy.^[2][3]

• Анастасия Резниченко Скажи-ка, френд / Журнал «Итоги» № 47(754) от 22.11. 2010
• Дмитрий Лифанцев Олимпийская жаба / Экспресс Газета № 46 (823) от 15 11. 2010
• Article on Zoich's disqualification from the 2014 Olympic mascot competition by Comedy Central Insider, the news blog of Comedy Central, which broadcasts Futurama.
• Zoich creation process from Zhgun's studio (i.e. his employer).
• Original clip of Zoich on YouTube uploaded by Zhgun.