And sorry but I have no idea what you’re trying to say in your paragraph.

Let me try rephrasing it: Why do you think a manufacturer of a non-conformant product (who wants to be perceived as conformant) would intentionally use a nonstandard version of the mark, instead of the standard one? Note that the standard mark is not a certification or proof of conformance of any kind; it is merely a way for the manufacturer to affirm that they are conformant. It is illegal to sell non-conformant products in the European Economic Area regardless of if they carry the standard CE mark or not.

Regardless of why we’re literally looking at one in the OP. Which is, as if I need to repeat this, a literal suicide device.

Did you think we’re looking at an actual non-conformant product, and that it used a non-standard CE mark to deceive consumers? I thought it was pretty clear we were looking at a satirical fake product, and I assume the non-standard version of the CE mark was used unintentionally. If it was intentional, it was certainly not to deceive consumers but perhaps could have been an overcautious artist worried about trademark infringement.

FWIW i looked it up and the image in the post is an artwork titled “electric bath duck for suicidal tendency” created in 2001 by Nicolas Gaudron while he was at the Royal College of Art in London.

It was a brief meme in 2007, being featured on wired.com via ohgizmo.com via ubergizmo.com via gearfuse.com via haha.nu (this was back when there was more of a culture of attributing sources of things on the web). In 2011 it appeared on whokilledbambi.co.uk, and in 2016 it made it to /r/rubberducks.