community

They have an idea. They have programming skills. And now they have 182 days to create a prototype. This is the Prototype Fund, a German government program to support open-source projects. Superbloom has been providing support for the teams on “everything but code” since 2018 – from UX design to fundraising and everything in between. This blog post is for Prototype Fund teams, and really, it’s for anyone hoping to do a lot on a development project in a short time. Here’s how you make the most of 182 days!

Being a designer in Open Source (OS) isn’t always easy or straightforward, neither is it the same for all designers. Different open source projects are set up differently, hence demand different outputs and engagements from designers. In this blog, we list the six main tenets for a successful design contribution to OS projects.

At DWeb Camp 2023, we organized the event's first Design Track. This is a reflection on the valuable lessons we learned and our ongoing dedication to making the decentralized web more user-friendly, inclusive, and socially conscious in our future endeavors.

Organizations express their values through branding (logos, interface design, style guides, etc.). We examine how branding can encourage broad adoption of privacy-preserving technology.

2022 was a year full of shifts, adaptations and evolutions for so many in our community. For us, we launched a new identity, welcomed four new team members and three new fiscally sponsored projects, and partnered with many new organizations and funders. And, for many on our team, this year presented several opportunities to meet for the first time in person. These markers of growth and evolution could not have happened without the continued support from our community.

Since 2020, we've been working with our community to rebrand Simply Secure. This post explores how we collaboratively built our new identity as Superbloom.

You spoke. We listened. Why Simply Secure is evolving into Superbloom.

We created Building Blocks to provide actionable resources for existing and potential funders to better support digital infrastructure projects and communities of practice.

Would you like to hear how the move from deceptive design to trusted patterns is critical to our shared future? Would you like to learn more about how to make encrypted apps more inclusive and accessible? Do you need on the spot design and UX aid and advice to improve your tools? Simply Secure team members will be joining six sessions during Rightscon 2022: June 6-10. We’d love to see you, learn about your work, and collaborate. Come join us! .

This fall, we had the pleasure of working with Digital Democracy on their application, Mapeo. Mapeo is a mobile and desktop app that enables indigenous communities to map their lands, sites, and resources, as well as record and monitor environmental and legal abuses by corporations and the state. The app is used by communities around the world, and due to the sensitive nature of the data being recorded, contributing to Mapeo can be high-risk for users. Our design challenge focused on user safety: how to protect end users in the likely event that a community mapper’s phone is lost, seized, damaged, or stolen.

Mailvelope is a browser extension that makes it easy to use PGP encryption, whether you use Gmail, Outlook, or many other email providers. With the support of UXFund, Simply Secure worked with Mailvelope to support users who want to use an organization-wide PGP key to send an encrypted email. Kelsey Smith and Thomas Oberndörfer had a conversation in 2022, reflecting on the technical problem and the design process.

In 2021, Simply Secure challenged the status quo, brought a DEI lens to our our work with partners, explored opportunities for strategic programmative, evaluative, and design interventions in infrastructure, solidified partnerships to support global projects in design and usability, built and shared open resources, and actively engaged with our growing community.

How are hallway conversations and academic conferences recreated in the digital sphere? Convocation Research + Design and Simply Secure answer this question with support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, in the new report...

Through the OTF Usability Lab, we were fortunate enough to work with Digital Democracy (Dd) on their application, Mapeo – a mobile app that enables indigenous communities across the world to document and map all kinds of useful data. We interviewed Dd’s Lead UX Designer, Sabella Flagg, to learn more about her journey to non-profit design work.

We take a deeper look at three specific design challenges our team addressed in helping PREreview build a new open source platform that supports a more inclusive, community-oriented form of peer review and publication.

For the past two years, we’ve been working with PREreview to promote equity in academic publishing by helping to build a new open source platform that supports a more inclusive, community-oriented form of peer review and publication.

We interviewed 47 people and conducted 3 surveys to complete a 5-year retrospective impact report for the Mozilla Foundation’s Fellowships and Awards programs. You can read the full report here. The evaluation presents an in-depth look into the impact, strengths, and challenges of the Mozilla Fellowships and Awards programming, including recommendations for supporting leadership development in funding digital rights and internet freedom. Three key ecosystem findings: 1) Funding is essential and impactful, 2) Measuring impact is hard, and 3) Community is at the core.

As part of 2021’s virtual Mozilla Festival, our team designed an online zine-making workshop to better simulate an in-person experience and teach new designer skills. Learn how you can design a workshop of your own.

Since 2020, we've been working with our community to help rebrand Simply Secure. Here's where we are in the ongoing process of refreshing our name and identity.

We asked our community what they think of the name "Simply Secure" and our cheerful aesthetic. Here's what we found out.

Our request to Congress to continue the fight to protect internet freedom worldwide - and how you can help.

We’re working to improve the next generation of data journalism tools – and we need your help.