twistsmyth inspired me
I agree and support this direction 
Once we decide on a logo, can someone please update the forum favicon with it? A few of the other forums I’m on do that and it looks really cool. This thread seems to imply that’s it’s easy to do: How to change my favicon - support - Discourse Meta
Also helps for marketing and brand association. A cool logo and smiling face creates a positive first impression and leaves a much better mental anchor than a bunch of confusing crypto explained via text on a forum. Humans are visual creatures and anything we can do to make the project memorable, familiar, and approachable is a plus.
This is lit af
A suggestion though: maybe change the part that says “the color yellow as a reflection of jaundice” to something like “the color yellow as a reflection of the light that gives life to all things and creates possibility” or “yellow the color of the sunny future that is possible when people control their assets and thus their destinies” or “the color yellow as a beacon of hope that a future with privacy and respect is possible”. You know… something positive ¯_(ツ)_/¯
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don’t think I ever shared this on here but it was one of the limited edition stickers at GrinCon0.
Can share the svg if anybody wants it.
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How about something very simple, like Bitcoin’s style?
Something very simple, but that if you see a “G” with the two lines in the top and in the bottom, you’ll immediately know that is Grin.
To help progress the aspects related to the Grin symbology, it may be worth considering them more rigidly from the point of view of the main different use cases. I think the 3 main areas of usage are:
- A 3-letter currency code – for use by exchanges will almost certainly be required and one will be foisted upon the token if none is officially put forward by the project leadership.
- A symbol for the currency analogous to the $ for dollars, £ for pounds etc. – for making the token easier to denote in a single character i.e. the original reason such symbols evolved in the first place; while it may not be imperative, it would support and strengthen the eventual ‘brand’ for the token for PR purposes and raising awareness in general.
- A logotype – for promoting the concept in a more visually appealing way on website livery, promotional materials, stationery etc etc
These may overlap and complement each other but don’t necessarily have to incorporate each other. In fact, it can become overly contrived and lead to awkward solutions if this is insisted upon. The first two of these general uses are discussed on a separate thread re: currency symbol and it might be useful to keep them confined to there. This thread seems more concerned with the third general usage which is more pertinent to the branding /promotion/public representation.
The smiley face with the MW eyes seems to have traction as the primary logo to date and at this stage, it may not be feasible before mainnet is launched to get agreement on an alternative. However, it might be wise to consider a treatment for the word ‘Grin’ that would fit with the smiley/grinney face graphic logo for practical purposes i.e. a logotype in addition to the standalone logo.
When thinking about that, I would suggest being mindful of the types of people who the project needs to ultimately get interested in Grin. Like it or not, many of those will be persons/organizations with access to significant money/assets that need to be exchanged or moved from A to B. While the potential for nefarious actors to be interested is unavoidable, corporate folks should probably not be alienated. The existing smiley face already has echoes of slackery subversiveness with even a wry grin in the direction of Nirvana. I would suggest not going any further in that direction and to that end, the typeface, I would suggest, should be much cleaner and slicker than that Tradewinds typeface in the recent suggestion above. Similarly, attempting to draw too many associations to Potter-ania will confer a lack of seriousness to the whole project and only serve to confirm many cryptosceptic’s suspicions that the whole area is a self-indulgent, navel-gazing, fantasy-ridden nerdfest.
A potential way to progress the conversation might be to identify some ‘brand values’ as you would with any regular project where a logotype is required, and try to build up some ideas from there.
In my opinion, I’d suggest that at this stage, differentiation and intrigue trump “trusted corporate friendly branding”.
Grin is asking people to take a leap of faith and join a movement more than it is asking for people to soberly evaluate a technology (especially given all of the MW variants that will spring up). The most important brand value in that respect would be “bold, opinionated and rich in personality”.
Beam has a very corporate font and buttoned up appearance, and to me just looks (from a branding perspective) like “us too, here is our submission: crypto variant 4290328 for your evaluation”.
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@knaccc – thank you for your comments. Agree that differentiation and maybe some intrigue are no harm at all. Also, I am not advocating for “trusted corporate friendly” branding - I did not use this phrase. I would say that there is a difference between being corporate friendly and not alienating corporates, the latter being where my emphasis was. I agree that the Beam branding is very corporate and smacks of “crypto variant x”, which seems undesirable and not fitting for the Grin project.
I guess the overarching point is that there are two extremes here and a whole spectrum in between. I am sounding a note of caution regarding not going too far in the “trying to be anarchic and radical” end of the spectrum since a currency is pointless if nobody’s using it. I figured the exercise of identifying the brand values might help to strike an appropriate point on the spectrum.
Regarding the brand values that you suggested of “bold, opinionated and rich in personality”
- “bold” – I can see this: a project that setting out to create a new globally useful currency with powerful promises of secure, private transactions within a highly scalable framework that could ultimately dislodge existing methods of exchanging valuable assets and money on a ginormous scale etc etc certainly fits with “bold”
- “opinionated” – possibly, from the point of view that this is the crypto that folks have been waiting for, this is the way to do crypto, this is the bitcoin killer, it is better than anything done in this space to date etc etc The corollary could be a degree of arrogance though…n’est-ce pas?
- “rich in personality” – probably a generally desirable value for a new brand with high aspirations for likeability and to attract positive regard on the web, in the media etc etc
I think some additions/altrnatives need to also be considered. This is an entity that the project sponsors hope will be used to represent and exchange value – potentially very large amounts – securely and privately. Therefore, surely it also needs to project values such as “trustworthiness”, “reliability”, “(user)friendliness”, “honesty”, a tendency towards white magick rather than black … etc. These sorts of values I would argue are difficult to project with typefaces that are too rough/unpredictable/ esoteric /anarchic…
Notwithstanding that the project is at the early stages, it could be very difficult to adjust the brand initially projected, after the fact. Thus, I am advocating for giving these brand values deeper consideration now than seems to have been done to date and I would also encourage members of the core dev team to think a bit more about this before the launch of mainnet.
I’d say Grin is extraordinarily arrogant. But that’s why I like it. You think you can redesign a cryptocurrency so that it will have no wallet addresses?! Who the hell do you people think you are?!
In my assessment, Grin isn’t in the category of “look how we’ve made cryptocurrency so much better. If you liked what already exists, you’ll love how much better we’ve made it”.
Grin has fundamentally thrown away the most basic of assumptions about how a cryptocurrency should work (in terms of not having wallet addresses). Whatever font the logo uses, there is no getting around the fact that Grin is an intrinsically unorthodox experiment.
Therefore for people to have confidence in Grin, they will have to believe deep in their gut that this project is driven by a team that revels in tearing up the rulebook (scriptless scripts, etc) and in finding the will to force the world to realign themselves with this new approach.
I don’t think it’s possible to simultaneously project “we’re maverick rule breakers, which is why this bold and unorthodox experiment will succeed” and “don’t worry, we’re not too radical”.
@knasss: I think you can project innovativeness and originality without appearing to be “trying too hard” but I am not intending to get into a back and forth on that digression. The motivation here is that a font does need to be chosen to accompany the logo and soon!
Going back to the brand values as a basis, what do you think about the brand values of “trustworthiness”, “reliability” etc? Are there others that should be thought about?
Anyone else have an opinion on this?
Maybe it would help if you elaborated on what exactly trustworthiness and reliability actually mean in the context of a decentralized project. To me, those are the long term results of succeeding in building adoption, momentum and thought leadership. No matter how great we think the current devs and mathematicians are, the code can’t be trusted unless enough of the world gets so deeply involved with Grin that the code really is being scrutinized widely and in great detail. That also touches on the reliability angle, as does the concept that if people don’t care, Grin will never get enough miners and vendors for anyone to have any confidence that it’ll matter in 5 years. You can’t rely on a project that dies of lack of interest.
I don’t therefore think that trustworthiness or reliability can be meaningfully signaled through branding, especially given a landscape where it’s the very scammiest of projects that seem to have the highest production values when it comes to branding and presentation. If anything, I think people will trust Grin more if it is rough around the edges.
The existing smiley face already has echoes of slackery subversiveness
Perish the thought, forgive my french but by gos darned golly we better change that post-haste
caution regarding not going too far in the “trying to be anarchic and radical” end of the spectrum since a currency is pointless if nobody’s using it.
Building a state-friendly currency is pointless if the state slams the door bitcoin opened and returns to the policy of shutting down private currencies by targeting the creators
Trustworthiness and reliability mean things that are trustworthy and reliable ; )
I didn’t suggest the ginning face should be changed and I never used the phrase or implied a “state-friendly currency”. Go back to the germane point: what brand values should the token try to project to get it used by a meaningful number of people?
When is a coin not Corp friendly yet is state friendly?
Markets exist on a spectum of state bullshit to free, and besides the military that shade is darkest in banking. Kyc and and freezing accounts at the drop of a hat when someone asks are the requirements for making a Corp friendly coin and it’s the exact same shit that can be used to harass political dissents
I think you’re looking for a different forum
Hello Grin community.
I saw this thread and appreciated @tromp 's thoughts around the 3 cubes. Thinking it was a shame this wasn’t explored more. So I did.
I’m happy to help out more is you like?
Cheers Chris
