When we were at the Environmental Council of the States (ECOS) Fall Meeting, one of the questions we kept hearing was “What does Apaluma mean? And what is the story behind your logo?” We loved telling the story in Santa Fe, and we thought we’d share it here too.
Apaluma is pronounced apa-luma.
The name comes from our hope that everyone can collaborate to illuminate open government data - information that is often scattered, locked in PDFs, or hidden in archives. Apaluma can digitize these regulatory documents and make them easy to use.
That’s where “Apa” comes in: the idea that anyone should be able to pull out their phone, use an app and see real-time environmental conditions alongside decades of permitting data.
The second half “Luma” comes from the Latin for light. It’s a nod to our mission of illuminating dark data, but also to our AI agent, Luma, who helps bring insights to the surface.
And then there’s our logo.
At first glance, you see a seahorse. That’s not just because we think they’re beautiful (though they are!), but because the hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for memory, takes its name from the Greek word for seahorse because of its distinctive shape. Just as the hippocampus is our brain’s data archive, Apaluma is designed to collect and preserve environmental data, turning it into knowledge we can use.
But if you look closer, you’ll notice something else. Hidden in the negative space is an elephant. That was important to us, because Apaluma isn’t just about environmental data regarding oceans or rivers, it’s about land, air, and ecosystems too. The seahorse and elephant together represent the full picture of the environment we’re working to monitor and protect.
Finally, our gradient logo glows, with the seahorse’s head and the word “luma” illuminated. It’s a simple reminder of what we’re here to do - illuminate data for actionable intelligence.
Originally published on Alicia J. Keyes’ Substack.