Hi everyone,

I hope this email finds you well and at some ease, in the midst of all things.

Thanks Tuomas for keeping this conversation going, as we all work on improving how the CentOS Project makes decisions in the open as a community. In this long-ish email I am going to describe the open decision process the Board of Directors wants to see followed for this logo work. The same process can be applied to the website redesign, too.

= Context

With apologies for any confusion I caused for Tuomas, Alain, and Simas--who have held an excellent open design discussion ( https://git.centos.org/centos/Artwork/issue/1 )--I am making a few minor adjustments in the plan to slow things down a bit. To make sure that people across the CentOS community are at least aware of what is being worked on.

I think some people with a stake in this project are not fully aware of the proposed changes, and need an opportunity especially as participants and contributors to give input, feedback, and design thinking toward the final logo.

It hasn't been clear so far where decisions should be made, who chooses what goes into the final design, and who says that design should be the new logo. Or even if there should be a new logo at all!

The unclear part is largely because the CentOS Board hasn't communicated our intentions clearly, I'm sorry about that, and I'd like to fix that here.

The process the CentOS Board wants should look like the one below. We're asking the three designers who have done the work so far (areguera, brokenkeyframe, tigert) to lead this discussion. I am the Director responsible for supporting that discussion and helping it get to a conclusion.

The goal is to have a design that the community likes, understands, and accepts, which the Board of Directors can basically rubber-stamp, i.e., approve without further discussion/argument. (Expect some Directors to provide input as community members, that is how we get our voices heard in the design decision process.)

= Open design decision process

0. I have taken the logo off the Board agenda for the next meeting, and won't put it back on until after this community has concluded its process.

1. For the next $time_period (perhaps until 08 April?) is the second-to-last window for input on the design, and suggestions for any new designs are also considered.

2. For two (or three?) weeks after that ~08 April date, the current and new designs undergo iterations between the designers. This includes the designers involved so far plus anyone else who comes along willing to do the work.

3. During those design iteration weeks, the process includes a robust back-and-forth between the designers that the rest of the community can observe. Designers set their own tolerance for how much feedback they want during this time window. They may choose, for example, to do a daily survey of design iterations using a survey tool to help them track the sentiment without wading through comments.

4. At the end of the design iteration weeks, the designers send back to the community the design(s) they feel are worthy of further consideration or decision. These may be the final design suggestions, depending on how the collective designers feel.

5. For two weeks following, interested community members are involved in helping choose the final design. Or those are two weeks of feedback, followed by another design iteration window, depending on the consensus of the designers and the interested community. I recommend we only schedule up to two iterations, and welcome the insight of the waaaaay more experienced designers as to what they want.

6. The final decision is approved (rubber-stamped) by the Board; I conclude the trademark work in parallel.

The above can be slowed down even further -- it might be too fast with the way things are right now in the world; there is no need to rush, we just don't want an open-ended process. It's better to set a deadline and adjust it outward, at this point.

What do you all think about this?

Best - Karsten

On 3/18/20 5:27 AM, Tuomas Kuosmanen wrote:

Hello everyone. I hope everyone is coping as well as possible in the current events.

There has been a collaborative design effort to update the CentOS logo and brand, and 

we are on the agenda of the next CentOS board meeting (in a week) to present an update to the current CentOS branding for approval. We are excited to be at this point.

In the spirit of openness, and because we are human, it could be that some of us have missed the earlier mail about this [https://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos-devel/2020-January/036517.html] So, I am announcing this yet once more, to make sure everyone is aware of our progress, the upcoming decision, and has a final chance to voice possible concerns and give feedback.

I want to avoid sending attachments to the mailing list, so please see the blog post i wrote on January which summarizes the process and features the proposed logo and brand updates: https://blog.centos.org/2020/01/updating-the-centos-logo-and-visual-style/

Also, the issue on git.centos.org can be interesting reading for anyone interested in how we have reached this point: https://git.centos.org/centos/Artwork/issue/1

The feedback we have received so far has been positive and constructive, so let us know of any concerns you might have.

Best regards,

Tuomas Kuosmanen

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