Script for setting a nice raspberry pi logo as MOTD on debian.

raspi-motd.sh

#!/bin/bash

logo="$(tput setaf 2)
       .~~.   .~~.
      '. \ ' ' / .'$(tput setaf 1)
       .~ .~~~..~.    $(tput sgr0)                   _                          _ $(tput setaf 1)
      : .~.'~'.~. :   $(tput sgr0)   ___ ___ ___ ___| |_ ___ ___ ___ _ _    ___|_|$(tput setaf 1)
     ~ (   ) (   ) ~  $(tput sgr0)  |  _| .'|_ -| . | . | -_|  _|  _| | |  | . | |$(tput setaf 1)
    ( : '~'.~.'~' : ) $(tput sgr0)  |_| |__,|___|  _|___|___|_| |_| |_  |  |  _|_|$(tput setaf 1)
     ~ .~ (   ) ~. ~  $(tput sgr0)              |_|                 |___|  |_|    $(tput setaf 1)
      (  : '~' :  )
       '~ .~~~. ~'
           '~'
$(tput sgr0)"

if [ `whoami` != "root" ]; then
  echo "$logo"
  echo "Run as root to update your motd."
else
  echo "$logo" > /etc/motd.tail
  /etc/init.d/bootlogs
  echo "Updated MOTD. Log in to see the new logo."
fi

There is a utility called toilet available via apt which lets you create coloured banners. The trick is to get toilet to export its output to ansi (much like how in this example the output of tput is). toilet -f big "text in font" --filter gay --export ansi > motdfile

lolcat is nice approach I guess