I think it was always like that? Dino can confirm as I figure he made it in the first place. I always thought it was a cool logo for the forum to have.
if you look at the original Carvin add (Photo of Vinnie standing on top of of a stack of Carvin amps) which this image has been taken from & altered. You can see that it does look like Vinnie is giving the finger. (http://www.carvinmuseum.com/decade/imag ... ncent.html).... 'Cool Vinnie's giving Gene & Paul the finger' Yer Cool hee hee.(In a Beavis and Butt-head voice).
Birnie is just messing with us. He means altered in that the pic has been turned into a cartoon like image, from the original photo, which is this one of course.