Brainstorm: Representing OLS' Values

[Ismael-KG]

This issue is to discuss how we represent (in colour, image, text...) the values of OLS. We can follow two stages for this:

• [X] First, we should collate resources that discuss OLS' values (there should be useful info across OLS' repositories, social media activity and website). We want to understand what the values of OLS are, which requires research.
  • From the website: Education, Transparency, Open science, Modesty, Community, Respect, Responsibility
  • From the code of conduct: Be friendly and patient, be welcoming, be considerate, be respectful, be careful in the words that we choose, try to understand why we disagree.
• [ ] Second, we can discuss how the values can be represented, or what they look like (some thoughts on the links between meaning and design are already shared in #34).

Everyone is welcome to contribute to this issue!

[caxrii]

@Ismael-KG To collate resources that discuss OLS' values and understand what the values of OLS are we need to note important things like

1. Trademark, logo and tagline
2. Visual assets
3. Digital assets
4. Marketing and advertising strategy
5. Social media engagement levels
6. Customer retention

[Ismael-KG]

Can you link to places where OLS discusses its values?

[caxrii]

Okay

[NPDebs]

Can you link to places where OLS discusses its values?

For sure...

[jilaga]

Here is somewhere on the website that speaks on the core values of OLS https://openlifesci.org/community I went ahead to list them below for accessibility

Education: Educate scientists about open science

Transparency: Emphasize transparency and the sharing of resources, material, knowledge, and experiences

Open science: Promote citizen science and decentralized access to science

Modesty: Know you don’t know everything

Community: Carefully listen to any concerns and questions and respond honestly

Respect: Respect humans and all living systems

Responsibility: Recognize the complexity and dynamics of science and research and our responsibility towards them

[NPDebs]

@Ismael-KG Thank you for opening this issue.

These resources provide a view of some core OLS values...

https://openlifesci.org/code-of-conduct

https://github.com/open-life-science/policies-procedures-and-docs/blob/main/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md

[iremide1022]

Wow, thanks @jilaga i was about to ask for resources to use

[jilaga]

@Ismael-KG Thank you for opening this issue.

These resources provide a view of some core OLS values...

https://openlifesci.org/code-of-conduct

I like these ones in the code of conduct. "a welcoming, friendly, and harassment-free environment for everyone to learn and grow by contributing."

[jilaga]

Wow, thanks @jilaga i was about to ask for resources to use

A pleasure. @NPDebs shared more resources too

[Ismael-KG]

Super! @jilaga shared values from the website and @NPDebs has found those of the code of conduct (I'll past these here):

Be friendly and patient. Be welcoming: We strive to be a community that welcomes and supports people of all backgrounds and identities. This includes, but is not limited to members of any race, ethnicity, culture, national origin, colour, immigration status, social and economic class, educational level, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, age, size, family status, political belief, religion, and mental and physical ability. Be considerate: Your work will be used by other people, and you in turn will depend on the work of others. Any decision you take will affect users and colleagues, and you should take those consequences into account when making decisions. Remember that we're a world-wide community, so you might not be communicating in someone else's primary language. Be respectful: Not all of us will agree all the time, but disagreement is no excuse for poor behavior and poor manners. We might all experience some frustration now and then, but we cannot allow that frustration to turn into a personal attack. It’s important to remember that a community where people feel uncomfortable or threatened is not a productive one. Be careful in the words that we choose: We are a community of professionals, and we conduct ourselves professionally. Be kind to others. Do not insult or put down other participants. Harassment and other exclusionary behavior aren't acceptable. This includes, but is not limited to: Violent threats or language directed against another person, Discriminatory jokes and language, Posting sexually explicit or violent material, Posting (or threatening to post) other people’s personally identifying information (“doxing”), Personal insults, especially those using racist or sexist terms, Unwelcome sexual attention, Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior, Repeated harassment of others. In general, if someone asks you to stop, then stop. Try to understand why we disagree: Disagreements, both social and technical, happen all the time. It is important that we resolve disagreements and differing views constructively. Remember that we’re different. Diversity contributes to the strength of our community, which is composed of people from a wide range of backgrounds. Different people have different perspectives on issues. Being unable to understand why someone holds a viewpoint doesn’t mean that they’re wrong. Don’t forget that it is human to err and blaming each other doesn’t get us anywhere. Instead, focus on helping to resolve issues and learning from mistakes.

With @Caxri7's comments and #34 in mind, how do we represent these values?

[NPDebs]

@jilaga You're a starrrrr!!! 🌟🤩🙌🏼

[NPDebs]

@Ismael-KG For starters, we can take each of these values, condense them into taglines and add to logos and other features on the website. 🤔 E.g.

Also... We can use colors to portay those values too. For instance, yellow speaks "joy, energy and life," and can be used to represent the brand's friendly and welcoming nature.

We can also represent them visually, without literally spelling it out. E.g. This clearly says "community" and "collaboration."

[jilaga]

@jilaga You're a starrrrr!!! 🌟🤩🙌🏼

you swoon me 😃

[latifatakin]

Core values of Open Life Sciences from the code of conduct present on GitHub https://github.com/open-life-science/policies-procedures-and-docs/blob/c342530ffe943bcc1a84a1a8a8e3b5b3c0fa4547/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md

1) Friendly 2)Welcoming 3) Considerate 4) Diverse 5) Inclusive

On the OLS website, https://openlifesci.org/community you can find the values;

Education: Educate scientists about open science Transparency: Emphasize transparency and the sharing of resources, material, knowledge and experiences Open science: Promote citizen science and decentralized access to science Modesty: Know you don't know everything Community: Carefully listen to any concerns and questions and respond honestly Respect: Respect humans and all living systems Responsibility: Recognize the complexity and dynamics os science and research and our responsibility towards them

How can the values be represented? OLS values can be represented in various ways, an example is through the brand identity. The brand color should be friendly and welcoming. Color plays a role in the psychology of users. To portray that OLS is a welcoming and friendly brand, we have to use colors that are known to induce such emotions. Typography; Typography is as important as color. To portray a friendly environment, we should use fonts that are known to portray friendliness. UX Copy; The OLS website copy should make users feel included.

[jilaga]

How can the values be represented?

We are already having discussions on rebranding so I'm guessing we would end up with an expanded color palette. Colors help to forge visual connections of a company’s personality and values. We can visually communicate the community values by choosing the right color combinations to work with.

Also on Typefaces/Fonts, The font used in designing the current logo of OLS as stated in the repository is Raleway. Raleway is a sanserif font and sanserif fonts are used to signify sensible, minimal, and friendly so we could still maintain Raleway.

[Bisola15]

Phew! Finally here.

Super! @jilaga shared values from the website and @NPDebs has found those of the code of conduct (I'll past these here):

Be friendly and patient. Be welcoming: We strive to be a community that welcomes and supports people of all backgrounds and identities. This includes, but is not limited to members of any race, ethnicity, culture, national origin, colour, immigration status, social and economic class, educational level, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, age, size, family status, political belief, religion, and mental and physical ability. Be considerate: Your work will be used by other people, and you in turn will depend on the work of others. Any decision you take will affect users and colleagues, and you should take those consequences into account when making decisions. Remember that we're a world-wide community, so you might not be communicating in someone else's primary language. Be respectful: Not all of us will agree all the time, but disagreement is no excuse for poor behavior and poor manners. We might all experience some frustration now and then, but we cannot allow that frustration to turn into a personal attack. It’s important to remember that a community where people feel uncomfortable or threatened is not a productive one. Be careful in the words that we choose: We are a community of professionals, and we conduct ourselves professionally. Be kind to others. Do not insult or put down other participants. Harassment and other exclusionary behavior aren't acceptable. This includes, but is not limited to: Violent threats or language directed against another person, Discriminatory jokes and language, Posting sexually explicit or violent material, Posting (or threatening to post) other people’s personally identifying information (“doxing”), Personal insults, especially those using racist or sexist terms, Unwelcome sexual attention, Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior, Repeated harassment of others. In general, if someone asks you to stop, then stop. Try to understand why we disagree: Disagreements, both social and technical, happen all the time. It is important that we resolve disagreements and differing views constructively. Remember that we’re different. Diversity contributes to the strength of our community, which is composed of people from a wide range of backgrounds. Different people have different perspectives on issues. Being unable to understand why someone holds a viewpoint doesn’t mean that they’re wrong. Don’t forget that it is human to err and blaming each other doesn’t get us anywhere. Instead, focus on helping to resolve issues and learning from mistakes.

With @Caxri7's comments and #34 in mind, how do we represent these values?

Thank you @NPDebs and @jilaga for the resources. These values can be portrayed in ways everyone has mentioned above.

While there is a theory on colour psychology about how different colours evoke different emotions in people, I have also read somewhere that the theory can be bent. The perception of colour and a brand depends on how it used by the brand. I say this because OLS already has a shade of green as a brand colour that we don’t necessarily need to change. We can channel other colours as secondary colours to send the message we want to users.

Like @latifatakin mentioned, Copies. There is a strong power in using the right copies. When copies are used right, they communicate and sell the brand in clear manner to its users and investors. Copies are used to set brand tone and OLS as a friendly community will lean towards informal tone.

I agree with @jilaga on Typeface. San serif fonts are the ones that best denote friendliness and since OLS already have that we can continue to work with it. We can also work with other san serif fonts and do some testing to see what works best. I know some really sweet typeface for suggestion 😅

@NPDebs You were in my house last night 👀, I just know it!

[Bharlikiss]

You ladies are giving me joy @jilaga @latifatakin @NPDebs . Fonts are like outfits , they provide people with first impressions about a brand, because they are the first things people notice about the brand, hence they set the tone of the brand which is why we have to be strategic and intentional about the font selection too.

I agree with @Bisola15 suggestion about Sans-serif because it embrace simplicity and the feeling of being modern, youthful, approachable, fun, informal, friendly, casual , cutting-edge and it is very humanistic just like OLS .

Hence my Sans-serif typeface suggestion is Open Sans

Open Sans is versatile and give room for communicating different messages throughout your design with just a single font and it was was designed with an upright stress, open forms and a neutral, yet friendly appearance. It was optimized for print, web, and mobile interfaces, and has excellent legibility characteristics in its letter forms.

[niyolynate]

Hello Friends, I have been researching about the name i found the following, basing on the values we have worked on in our current cohort of OLS, the fliers, looking for a universal name that could compile all but still back up the core of OLS.

Hope , Fire, Courage and others. in the following Values Open Source, Empower, Hope, Community.

I chose the following.

OCTE - Open Community for Technology and Empowerment.

[Chalcedony219]

My people with the sharp brains!

I want to start by saying that if OLS has a mantra, we should be told what it is. This will guide us in choosing a fitting tagline for the brand. This is vital because now that OLS wants to be more encompassing and accommodating of not only physical sciences but Tech and Law, we should have a tagline that suggests a general message to everyone in the necessary fields.

Regarding colours, I'm sort of cool with the existing colors. Maybe more usage of the color green will make the site more visually pleasing but the green, white and black is very cool and balanced. It is also quite minimalistic which is the new trend now.

For typefaces, just like @Bisola15 and @jilaga suggested, I definitely subscribe to Sans Serif fonts. This is because the sans serif fonts are considered more modern and minimalistic in nature. These fonts are also quite legible, very orderly and clean in appearance.

I, for one, love the typeface used in Slack app: LARSSEIT. If not, there are great Sans serif fonts like OPTIMA, GILL SANS, VERDANA and so many others.

I rest my case for now 😂

[iremide1022]

Alot has been said by my colleagues, when talking about how to represent values like that of OLS, it basically is all about research as we all know, the frontier we would be giving should as much as possible indicate what exactly we are talking about research, science, core values, community so how could all these be represented all at once;

1. A text has been mentioned already, the sans sarif font it’s giving an expression of a core value
2. I would have that we maintain the green color as we all know it represents life, science 🧪 , this issue is actually giving more reasons to think and teaching us how to be precise and simple 👍 Or has any designs for open science been accepted yet?

[Bisola15]

Alot has been said by my colleagues, when talking about how to represent values like that of OLS, it basically is all about research as we all know, the frontier we would be giving should as much as possible indicate what exactly we are talking about research, science, core values, community so how could all these be represented all at once;

1. A text has been mentioned already, the sans sarif font it’s giving an expression of a core value
2. I would have that we maintain the green color as we all know it represents life, science 🧪 , this issue is actually giving more reasons to think and teaching us how to be precise and simple 👍 Or has any designs for open science been accepted yet?

Hi @iremide1022 no, no design has been accepted yet. The green colour is not only limited to science. Yunno Yo mentioned that OLS is now beyond life sciences and sciences in general. Philosophers, Anthropologist, Lawyers and so on are among contributors so we need to accomodate them. The green colour is still okay though as you said, not because of it's association to life but because it's a simple colour that's friendly and easily identified with.

I agree with you that OLS is teaching us how to be more precise, detailed yet simple in approach. 😌 I like it

[Bisola15]

You ladies are giving me joy @jilaga @latifatakin @NPDebs . Fonts are like outfits , they provide people with first impressions about a brand, because they are the first things people notice about the brand, hence they set the tone of the brand which is why we have to be strategic and intentional about the font selection too.

I agree with @Bisola15 suggestion about Sans-serif because it embrace simplicity and the feeling of being modern, youthful, approachable, fun, informal, friendly, casual , cutting-edge and it is very humanistic just like OLS .

Hence my Sans-serif typeface suggestion is Open Sans

Open Sans is versatile and give room for communicating different messages throughout your design with just a single font and it was was designed with an upright stress, open forms and a neutral, yet friendly appearance. It was optimized for print, web, and mobile interfaces, and has excellent legibility characteristics in its letter forms.

@Bharlikiss Your description of fonts as outfits; I love it!! Captures the essence of fonts in a summary. The suggestion about Open Sans. I do agree with all you said about Open Sans, quite spot on, but it is kind of also what sets a limitation to it's usage. Open Sans is a go to Typeface for a lot of brand or people who wants a sans serif font hence it is widely used and the uniqueness is starting to wear off/ if not already. If OLS will be changing it's typeface, we can suggest other neat sans serif font that are not as widely used but still packed with value. What do you think?

[Bisola15]

Hello Friends, I have been researching about the name i found the following, basing on the values we have worked on in our current cohort of OLS, the fliers, looking for a universal name that could compile all but still back up the core of OLS.

Hope , Fire, Courage and others. in the following Values Open Source, Empower, Hope, Community.

I chose the following.

OCTE - Open Community for Technology and Empowerment.

Well done @niyolynate The open community does work, but the technology part is still is still something, hmmmm. OLS is trying to work towards an all encompassing name for all it's members

[niyolynate]

@Bisola thank U for the headsup. Its amazing how this makes total relief. Because this will totally welcome all talents. Am going to check my gramma and rewrites. 😉 Again.

[AdeolaAdekoya]

I like Open Sans its modern. and in regard to the color green, it represents life also, so it doesn't just relate to people who are in science fields.

Using a font checker, I saw that OLS currently uses BlinkMacSystemFont on its website and Raleway in the Logo. Which is a thinner font and minimalist font, which I think we can also stick to that.

However, Inter is also a great font and is popular for its ability to maintains great readability on all screen sizes. Oh, and it's open source too 😂. When using font psychology, Sans serif fonts represent cleanliness, modern, and engaging. Which is exactly what we are tying to communicate here. Clean in the sense that OLS is simple and east to navigate, more meaning it's "forward-thinking" and engaging, which is exactly what the community is.

@Ismael-KG when you say "how the values can be represented, or what they look like" do you mean on the website?

I was thinking of a more unified pallet so when they are all used in one place it doesn't cause confusion because they don't fit together or contrast issues. If we still decide to, maybe a much simpler color palette.

Each value represents different things, so I believe they should stand alone. I think a good way to represent them is by putting it in a grid with an icon for visual representation and a warm, short and concise copy that explain what it is which OLS already has.

Another way I think it can be represented in by sorting them into cards. In doing this, we can now explore the use of various colors that aren't too flashy, so they pass across the message and grab attention.

[Preciousutos]

Fantastic feedbacks so far and I mostly agree with our contribution to the importance of color and typography as they must accommodate the band values. San serif fonts accommodate OLS values. As for colors, I did a little research earlier, I listed out the OLS values stated above by @NPDebs @jilaga @latifatakin and searched for the colors associated with most of them (color psychology). Here are my findings Open: Blue Science: Green/golden yellow Friendly: Yellow Welcoming: Yellow or lime green Inclusive: Yellow Education: Light blue Modesty: Gray Responsibility: Blue Personally speaking, I'll go for a colour just in between blue and green and not too bright, or a combination of a bright and dark colour for a better blend, or a slightly darker shade of the brand colour and another cool color. Also, these values can be represented in the brand's voice (tone) and messages which includes content across all media, printables, images, videos and illustrations. For the logo and perception of the brand, I'll suggest slightly circular edges as that as well with san serif fonts indicates friendly and welcoming

[salmasabo]

@Ismael-KG After going through the Ols website I found out that it is a community where everyone is welcome,friendly and a positive environment,to represent this value colors such as yellow,white can be used because they symbolize happiness,warmth in a community which aligns with this value.

OLS supports people of all backgrounds and identities,therein images that represents people of various skin tones and also people with disabilities can be used to show Ols as a community that is diverse,inclusive and opens its arms to people regardless of background.

Once the whole concept is finalized the shape format it could take could be in a circular format because circular images give a feeling of whole,togetherness which is what a community is about

And finally for the text a sans-serif font such as Visby could be used because it gives off a warm and friendly feeling and generally most sans serif fonts give off that.

[MargaretPearl]

The Thought Process Every ideas is born and backed by all kinds of ways to engineer it to life.

The bulb connected to the stem of the tree represents the how the ideas come to life. The tree and the tech represent a refined idea well packaged into different branches of science with the blooming tree and a strong back bone linked to the initial idea

How the logo corresponds with values
Community : How the different nodes (keep branching out into the different directions represent the innovation, growth and also the different Cohorts of Open Life Science) Open Science, Education and Modesty: The Nodes connect to the light bulb (the roots) represents the open science and Modesty, that through community and different ideas coming together produces different branches. The Stem that connects to the light bulb then the node also represents education from the ideation level right into the grown tree.

@Ismael-KG For starters, we can take each of these values, condense them into taglines and add to logos and other features on the website. 🤔 E.g.

Also... We can use colors to portay those values too. For instance, yellow speaks "joy, energy and life," and can be used to represent the brand's friendly and welcoming nature.

We can also represent them visually, without literally spelling it out. E.g. This clearly says "community" and "collaboration."


[Ismael-KG]

Oh my goodness, so many great ideas! As usual, a bit of a summary from me (and a question because I am easily confused 😅

We seem to be converging on:

• Colour: green!
• Font: Something sans serif

My question is prompted by comments by @latifatakin and @Bisola15: what are "copies" in this context?

@AdeolaAdekoya, you asked whether I meant representing values on the website. I think my answer is "no," but I'm not sure! I meant how do we represent the values (education, transparency, welcoming, considerate, etc.) visually. That said, this might be another question worth asking: What elements of OLS' branding can represent its values? (@Caxri7's very first comment here might have answered this already!)

[Bisola15]

Oh my goodness, so many great ideas! As usual, a bit of a summary from me (and a question because I am easily confused 😅

We seem to be converging on:

• Colour: green!
• Font: Something sans serif

My question is prompted by comments by @latifatakin and @Bisola15: what are "copies" in this context?

@AdeolaAdekoya, you asked whether I meant representing values on the website. I think my answer is "no," but I'm not sure! I meant how do we represent the values (education, transparency, welcoming, considerate, etc.) visually. That said, this might be another question worth asking: What elements of OLS' branding can represent its values? (@Caxri7's very first comment here might have answered this already!)

Hi @Ismael-KG you’re back to our land!! 💃🏾💃🏾 copies are the texts that go on the website. The writings, the way they are structured, the tone they carry and how they inform the audience who/ what OLS is and their value is the definition of copy.

[Bisola15]

Oh my goodness, so many great ideas! As usual, a bit of a summary from me (and a question because I am easily confused 😅

We seem to be converging on:

• Colour: green!
• Font: Something sans serif

My question is prompted by comments by @latifatakin and @Bisola15: what are "copies" in this context?

@AdeolaAdekoya, you asked whether I meant representing values on the website. I think my answer is "no," but I'm not sure! I meant how do we represent the values (education, transparency, welcoming, considerate, etc.) visually. That said, this might be another question worth asking: What elements of OLS' branding can represent its values? (@Caxri7's very first comment here might have answered this already!)

The elements of OLS has yes been answered by @Caxri7. Virtually everyone who’s commented had noted the same things along the line 💃🏾💃🏾 we’re thinking!!

[Ismael-KG]

Thank you! Do people have thoughts on the elements that form a copy? How do we set out guidelines that inform a welcoming tone as opposed to, say, a very serious tone?

[latifatakin]

Oh my goodness, so many great ideas! As usual, a bit of a summary from me (and a question because I am easily confused 😅

We seem to be converging on:

• Colour: green!
• Font: Something sans serif

My question is prompted by comments by @latifatakin and @Bisola15: what are "copies" in this context?

@AdeolaAdekoya, you asked whether I meant representing values on the website. I think my answer is "no," but I'm not sure! I meant how do we represent the values (education, transparency, welcoming, considerate, etc.) visually. That said, this might be another question worth asking: What elements of OLS' branding can represent its values? (@Caxri7's very first comment here might have answered this already!)

Like @Bisola15 said, copy is the text that goes on the website. Hence, to represent OLS value, we need to write the copy in a way that our community members feel welcomed and included.

[latifatakin]

Thank you! Do people have thoughts on the elements that form a copy? How do we set out guidelines that inform a welcoming tone as opposed to, say, a very serious tone?

The elements that form a copy include;

The headline The sub heading The Call to actions Benefits Features

[jilaga]

Oh my goodness, so many great ideas! As usual, a bit of a summary from me (and a question because I am easily confused 😅

We seem to be converging on:

• Colour: green!
• Font: Something sans serif

My question is prompted by comments by @latifatakin and @Bisola15: what are "copies" in this context?

@AdeolaAdekoya, you asked whether I meant representing values on the website. I think my answer is "no," but I'm not sure! I meant how do we represent the values (education, transparency, welcoming, considerate, etc.) visually. That said, this might be another question worth asking: What elements of OLS' branding can represent its values? (@Caxri7's very first comment here might have answered this already!)

Thank you @Ismael-KG for encouraging our ideas. I think all the contributions so far to this issue suggest that OLS core values can be represented visually with choice of colors and fonts.

[Chalcedony219]

Thank you! Do people have thoughts on the elements that form a copy? How do we set out guidelines that inform a welcoming tone as opposed to, say, a very serious tone?

Like @latifatakin has highlighted, the parts of the website that people are conversant with should have the dopest copies. Firstly, we know who our target audience is and so, it won't be so difficult coming up with copies that they can relate to. For instance, a Gen Z is very likely to relate better with informal, very friendly and accommodating copies (I'm not a Gen Z, by the way).

If we recognise who our target audience is, we can understand better how to make our copies feel comfortable and relaxing for them. Copies are a way to get to people. You can't get to people if you don't understand the people you are trying to reach.

[jilaga]

Oh my goodness, so many great ideas! As usual, a bit of a summary from me (and a question because I am easily confused 😅 We seem to be converging on:

• Colour: green!
• Font: Something sans serif

My question is prompted by comments by @latifatakin and @Bisola15: what are "copies" in this context? @AdeolaAdekoya, you asked whether I meant representing values on the website. I think my answer is "no," but I'm not sure! I meant how do we represent the values (education, transparency, welcoming, considerate, etc.) visually. That said, this might be another question worth asking: What elements of OLS' branding can represent its values? (@Caxri7's very first comment here might have answered this already!)

Thank you @Ismael-KG for encouraging our ideas. I think all the contributions so far to this issue suggest that OLS core values can be represented visually with choice of colors and fonts.

and taglines

[niyolynate]

Since reading is how communication is done on a website, fonts play a big role in how the sound comes out. As we focus on presenting the core values, we need to convey this message in the simplest form Possible. Our associations with different inspirational typography trigger powerful ideas and emotions. So As the re-branding team his means that choosing the right typography will help us to fill the gaps of our brand personality these being the core values and the package to the readers sponsors and partners and the message we take out to the rest of the world.

If we think of picture superiority effect, human beings are more connected to visual stimulithan anything else. This means that if we want our brand to be remembered, we need to enhance its visual appeal. These fonts also associated most frequently with confidence, solidity, and a sense of bold attitude. Also we need to know that the wrong font could destroy the credibility of your brand. fonts also associated most frequently with confidence, solidity, and a sense of bold attitude.

Sans-serif Type will help convey stability and Welcoming to the public. These present the values of the Organization where one calls for customers and Partners while the other calls for the core values that make core and share , connect, empower, values be lifted.

They’re associated most frequently with confidence, solidity, and a sense of bold attitude. indicate a sense of honesty and sensibility but more it represent forward-thinking.

I choose Sans-serif for coy fonts, with change in size depending on the theme, call for action and colors simple.

• The headline
• The sub heading
• The Call to actions
• Benefits
• Features @latifatakin changing sizes and color where necessary.

[mkpouto-inyang]

@Ismael-KG I hope it's not too late to contribute to this.

The major values that OLS upholds include: Education, community, transparency, respect, Open Science, Modesty, and responsibility.

To ensure these values are properly represented by OLS, it helps to list out what design elements/principles, as well as other factors that give the brand its identity; that we would want to incorporate these values into.

Company's name: Although this is currently still in the works, it is good to keep in mind here that the name used should be more inclusive of other fields beyond science, since OLS is currently rebranding. A single name that instantly lets people know that this is a respectful community that prioritizes education.

Logo: The logo should maintain the green color currently used. This color plays a big role is the user's' psychology, and perfectly communicates the brand's identity and values.

Font: I suggest the use of open sans for the website content . One may say this is overused, and I agree. However, it is overused for a reason, it gets the job done! Open sans is a neutral, simplistic and legible font. It has been proven to be one of the safest font options to use. The purpose of the website content is to deliver useful information about your product or service offerings to your readers, so readability is very important here; and open sans is your best bet.

Color Palette: The color palette used is an important tool for communicating the brand's personality. The current primary color (green) is perfect. The subdued green shade has the same calmness that blue has. Hence, blue can also be considered as a secondary color in the color palette, as well as other neutrals. Seeing as these colors are not too bright, they communicate the perfect blend of seriousness to a reasonable degree, and at the same time pass on a friendly message.

Line spacing: This contributes to the entire composition of the content of the website.

Compare these three examples. It's clear the difference line spacing makes. Thankfully, the current spacing used on the OLS is perfect for the message being passed. If the line spacing were to be any less than it is, the words would look too tight together and would give off an overly serious and rigid image of the brand, rather than the friendly and welcoming aura that it currently gives.

Brand Imagery: Pictures are worth a thousand words. A lot can be communicated through these. The brand's choice of images should primarily take the values of community, modesty, education and education into consideration. Images with people from different works of life, different skin colors, as well as different backgrounds and cultures, depicts a strong sense of community, as well as respect (as it takes respect for differences, for people of varying cultures to work together in the first place). Currently, not many images are used on the site, and the ones used, only represent a single demographic, and this does not properly communicate the diversity that OLS welcomes. More diverse imagery like the one I explained earlier, should be used. This would make people feel more welcome and included.

Graphics (illustrations, patterns, textures, icons): These should be used mostly in the brand's colors and fit the overall direction of identity. They should also be simple and easy to correctly interpret so that the wrong message is not passed. It is also important that the shapes used in creating these icons and illustrations have a friendly and fluid touch to them, so the brand does not come off as being too rigid.

Copy: Last year I took a course on copy writing and realized how underrated it is. A brand's copy can make or mark the brand. Your brand is only as effective as how you communicate it. Consistently using a friendly and respectful, yet compelling tone or "brand voice", across all platforms, would properly communicate OLS' values. This also humanizes the brand, and people love brands they can connect with.

Social Media presence: I feel like OLS' social Media presence can be much stronger, especially on platforms like twitter. This is an avenue for OLS to clearly articulate its values in every post made, either explicitly or not. This adds an edge, even beyond subtle messages sent by the visual elements on the site. It also helps to make the posts engaging, such that the brand connects with them its target audience more. This way, it is even easier to find out what the audience genuinely thinks of the brand, and to confirm that the right message is passed across. It also builds a stronger community and would bring more traffic to the Website, where more of the brand's values are clearly expressed. Here, OLS can also practice strategic commenting, by leaving comments under posts of brands that clearly share similar values of education, respect, transparency, open science and modesty. It is usually clear, by association, what a person/brand stands for.

Note that it is important that all these elements should be combined in a way that they all align and deliver a coherent message.

[Preciousutos]

Hi @Ismael-KG, So copies in the context of representing OLS values are contents, content across several platforms. For your next question on the elements that form a copy, here are a few elements to consider:

1. A clear objective has to be stated as this will help influence how best to come up with a good copy
2. Brand voice and tone
3. Call to action
4. An image, illustration, or video helps capture the audience's attention. Eye-catching visuals captivate users and they give a better understanding of your messages. They are also easier to digest, as well as easier to remember as recent research shows how people have short attention spans and in turn prefer visuals.

With these in mind, one can create captivating headlines, subheadings, body text, captions, benefits, and features as earlier mentioned by @latifatakin.

To set out guidelines that inform a welcoming tone, let's first establish the difference between brand voice and tone. Brand voice is the brand's personality. It is the way a brand conveys its central values, principles, and style of communication with its audience. It must run consistently through all communication platforms ( social media, website, blog posts, emails, newsletters) no matter which teams are handling which channels, and it mustn’t change. OLS voice is welcoming, friendly, inclusive, diverse, and considerate

Brand tone is the mood or emotion you convey in your content to your audience through specific word choice and writing style. We all have unique voices, but our tone changes depending on the situation. This applies to branding. In defining the guidelines for OLS tone, first, we know with the OLS brand voice, its tone has to be informal but it's important to keep it simple and clear. Some guidelines to take note of;

1. Avoid the use of certain words like slang or jargon
2. The use of active voice rather than passive voice. The difference between active and passive voice can be found here https://www.grammarly.com/blog/active-vs-passive-voice/
3. Content should be relatable, the use of simple words
4. Abbreviations and acronyms should be spelled out at first when in use

Understanding OLS audience, creating a persona, and making a list of keywords will also help in crafting welcoming copies. A catchy opening sentence and clear introduction highlighting the structure of further content will serve well in keeping OLS audience across platforms. Implementing storytelling is also a good one. The effect of the copies on the audience can be tested once in a while, to see how the brand is perceived. This can be done by sending out surveys and improving copies in respect to the responses received.

[Ismael-KG]

You are all doing spectacular work and providing amazing insight – I hope you don't take it personally if I don't comment on exactly what you said!

I just want to mention some two thoughts based on @niyolynate's PR #46:

1. Font: Fonts have been mentioned above (by @latifatakin @Bisola15 @jilaga @Bharlikiss @Chalcedony219 and others!) but what about font size? Does anybody know of any standards for website font sizes? (@niyolynate's PR is very detailed on font sizes! 🎉)
2. Use of gradients as opposed to solid colours: Would we say gradients or solid colours best represent OLS' values? How levels of transparency for different elements?

[Chalcedony219]

You are all doing spectacular work and providing amazing insight – I hope you don't take it personally if I don't comment on exactly what you said!

I just want to mention some two thoughts based on @niyolynate's PR #46:

1. Font: Fonts have been mentioned above (by @latifatakin @Bisola15 @jilaga @Bharlikiss @Chalcedony219 and others!) but what about font size? Does anybody know of any standards for website font sizes? (@niyolynate's PR is very detailed on font sizes! 🎉)
2. Use of gradients as opposed to solid colours: Would we say gradients or solid colours best represent OLS' values? How levels of transparency for different elements?

Thank you, Ismael for your sweet words of praise. I think OLS is an embodiment of various streams of important values and different colors represent these concepts. I, personally, won't mind the subtle use of gradients in the use of colors. We can choose the colors that mostly represent these concepts and mix them very very well (the proper use of gradients can require some level of mastery). So, yes, I will choose gradients over bold colors.

[Ismael-KG]

@Chalcedony219 I feel where this is coming from: "the proper use of gradients can require some level of mastery" – I learned many moons ago that I don't know how to use them right, haha!

[NPDebs]

@Ismael-KG Thank you for creating an opening for us to obsess about gradients!!

Rather than using one or more solid colours that may be bland and underwhelming, it's always great to make things interesting using gradients. 😍😍

And hey, nothing screams "we are a community that welcomes people of every colour" like using multiple colours, combined in a beautiful synergy. 🥰🌈

Gradients are an innovative way to make the brand stand out! How? There are limitless possibilities when it comes to colour combination. This is bound to give OLS its unique identity! 🤍🕺

[Chalcedony219]

Exactly @Ismael-KG It's beyond just splashing pink with yellow and green. However, with the correct usage of gradients, one is guaranteed a kind of brand uniqueness. I mean, look at INSTAGRAM and FIREFOX for instances; beautiful usage of linear gradients

[jilaga]

We are unanimously agreeing on gradients, yes!! 💃🏽💃🏽 But then again, how far do we want to go from the current brand identity? 🤔

[latifatakin]

You are all doing spectacular work and providing amazing insight – I hope you don't take it personally if I don't comment on exactly what you said!

I just want to mention some two thoughts based on @niyolynate's PR #46:

1. Font: Fonts have been mentioned above (by @latifatakin @Bisola15 @jilaga @Bharlikiss @Chalcedony219 and others!) but what about font size? Does anybody know of any standards for website font sizes? (@niyolynate's PR is very detailed on font sizes! 🎉)
2. Use of gradients as opposed to solid colours: Would we say gradients or solid colours best represent OLS' values? How levels of transparency for different elements?

You are all doing spectacular work and providing amazing insight – I hope you don't take it personally if I don't comment on exactly what you said!

I just want to mention some two thoughts based on @niyolynate's PR #46:

1. Font: Fonts have been mentioned above (by @latifatakin @Bisola15 @jilaga @Bharlikiss @Chalcedony219 and others!) but what about font size? Does anybody know of any standards for website font sizes? (@niyolynate's PR is very detailed on font sizes! 🎉)
2. Use of gradients as opposed to solid colours: Would we say gradients or solid colours best represent OLS' values? How levels of transparency for different elements?

Thank you for the words of encouragement @Ismael-KG .

1) There are standards for choosing website font sizes for example, legibility, readability, scalability etc. But these are general standards. To determine font sizes, we need to use a typographic scale. We have several scales like the major second, minor second, golden ratio, minor third, major third etc. A good type scale we can use is the major third because of it’s responsiveness across web and mobile. We can use a type scale generator to determine the font sizes from H1 to H6 (Header 1 to Header 6) to Body text.

2) I think the idea of us using gradient is absolutely brilliant. We can use linear gradients in our design, we have to keep it simple and subtle though. This is where our secondary color comes in.

@Ismael-KG I have a question. Is there a design system for OLS?

[latifatakin]

We are unanimously agreeing on gradients, yes!! 💃🏽💃🏽 But then again, how far do we want to go from the current brand identity? 🤔

This is a good question. I will like to know also

[jilaga]

You are all doing spectacular work and providing amazing insight – I hope you don't take it personally if I don't comment on exactly what you said!

I just want to mention some two thoughts based on @niyolynate's PR #46:

1. Font: Fonts have been mentioned above (by @latifatakin @Bisola15 @jilaga @Bharlikiss @Chalcedony219 and others!) but what about font size? Does anybody know of any standards for website font sizes? (@niyolynate's PR is very detailed on font sizes! 🎉)

2. Use of gradients as opposed to solid colours: Would we say gradients or solid colours best represent OLS' values? How levels of transparency for different elements?

You are all doing spectacular work and providing amazing insight – I hope you don't take it personally if I don't comment on exactly what you said!

I just want to mention some two thoughts based on @niyolynate's PR #46:

1. Font: Fonts have been mentioned above (by @latifatakin @Bisola15 @jilaga @Bharlikiss @Chalcedony219 and others!) but what about font size? Does anybody know of any standards for website font sizes? (@niyolynate's PR is very detailed on font sizes! 🎉)

2. Use of gradients as opposed to solid colours: Would we say gradients or solid colours best represent OLS' values? How levels of transparency for different elements?

Thank you for the words of encouragement @Ismael-KG .

1) There are standards for choosing website font sizes for example, legibility, readability, scalability etc. But these are general standards.

To determine font sizes, we need to use a typographic scale. We have several scales like the major second, minor second, golden ratio, minor third, major third etc. A good type scale we can use is the major third because of it’s responsiveness across web and mobile. We can use a type scale generator to determine the font sizes from H1 to H6 (Header 1 to Header 6) to Body text.

2) I think the idea of us using gradient is absolutely brilliant. We can use linear gradients in our design, we have to keep it simple and subtle though. This is where our secondary color comes in.

@Ismael-KG I have a question. Is there a design system for OLS?

@latifatakin you're apt on the font sizing. We have some design guidelines in this repository, you could check the files.

[Ismael-KG]

@latifatakin what do you mean by design system?