The Rule
Book

Brand Essence

Outliers Summit is the founder conference for people building extraordinary things — the next chapter of the OOO Summit. Two days in NYC: Build Like an Outlier (Day 01) and Think Like an Outlier (Day 02), plus the invite-only Salon. The brand should feel like the room behind the room: technical, electric, and a little subversive — never corporate.

Personality

• Outlier, not insider — we celebrate the people three standard deviations out.
• Built, not theorized — bias toward makers, demos, and tactical substance.
• High-signal — dense, confident, no fluff or jargon.
• Electric — the thermal orb is energy made visible.

How we write the name

• Always Outliers Summit (two words). Never "Outlier Summit" or "OS Summit" in body copy.
• Day names: Build Like an Outlier · Think Like an Outlier. The invite-only track is The Salon.
• Date lockup: Nov 5–6, 2026 · NYC (en dash, not hyphen).

Logo

The wordmark is set in Spline Sans Mono Bold, all caps, tight tracking. Two lockups: horizontal (default) and stacked (square or vertical spaces). The orb mark is the standalone icon for avatars, favicons, and app tiles.

Clear space & minimum size

• Clear space: keep a margin equal to the cap-height of the "O" on all sides. Nothing enters that zone.
• Minimum size: horizontal wordmark no smaller than 120px wide on screen / 32mm in print. Orb mark no smaller than 24px.
• Color: white on dark (default), black on light, or single-color. The accent "MIT" treatment is for the full-color lockup only.

Do / Don't

Color

Black is the canvas. The four brights are accents — one dominant per asset, used in confident blocks, never muddy mixes. Hex is the source of truth for screen; CMYK / Pantone are starting points to proof on press.

CMYK and Pantone values are approximate conversions — always proof on the actual stock before a print run. Swatch files (.css / .scss / .json) are in the Library.

Usage

• 60 / 30 / 10: ~60% black, ~30% one accent, ~10% a second accent or white.
• One accent leads per asset (Day 01 leans orange, Day 02 purple, the Salon pink) — don't scatter all four evenly.
• Yellow is the interaction/selection color and reads as a highlight; use sparingly.

Typography

One typeface does everything: Spline Sans Mono. Bold all-caps for display, regular/medium for body and labels. The monospace grid is part of the brand — lean into it. Writer Quattro is the licensed editorial alternate for long-form where a mono face tires the eye.

Rules

• Display & labels: UPPERCASE, tight tracking (-0.01 to -0.02em) for headlines, wide tracking (0.08–0.18em) for labels.
• The // label mono-kicker prefixes section labels.
• Body copy is sentence case, normal tracking, never all-caps.
• Web fallback stack: "Spline Sans Mono", ui-monospace, monospace.

Graphic Language

The system that makes an asset unmistakably Outliers: the thermal orb, scanlines, film grain, and the keyline grid.

Thermal orbs

Radial gradients that read like heat maps / CRT phosphor. Five signature recipes (A–E). Use as hero shapes, backgrounds, sticker fills, or speaker placeholders. Always overlay faint vertical scanlines.

Texture & grid

• Scanlines: 1px vertical lines every 9px, ~10% opacity, soft-light blend.
• Grain: fractal-noise overlay at ~4.5% opacity over the whole canvas.
• Keylines: 1.5–2px borders, hard corners (no rounding) — frames, rules, dividers.
• Duotone portraits: grayscale + accent multiply (60%) + scanlines.
• Layout: generous margins, mono labels top-left, content bottom-anchored.

Photography

Photography is high-contrast and human — stage moments, candid crowd energy, founders mid-sentence. Always run through the brand duotone so photos sit inside the system rather than fighting it.

Duotone recipe

• Convert to grayscale, push contrast ~+8%.
• Multiply the lead accent at ~60% over the image.
• Overlay horizontal scanlines at ~16% (soft-light).
• Crop tight on faces; eyes in the upper third.

Do / Don't

Voice

Confident, direct, high-signal. We make statements, not questions. Short lines. No corporate jargon, no hype-speak, no emojis in body copy. Talk to a smart builder who's seen it all.

Boilerplate

Short: Outliers Summit — the founder conference for people building extraordinary things. Nov 5–6, 2026, NYC.

Long: Outliers Summit is a two-day gathering in New York City for the founders, operators, creators, and investors who build like outliers. Day 01 is hands-on building; Day 02 is the ideas that move markets — capped by the invite-only Salon, the room behind the room.

Voice in three lines

• Say: "The room behind the room." Not: "An unparalleled networking opportunity."
• Say: "Build like an outlier." Not: "Unlock your potential."
• Say: "Two days. One city. Zero fluff." Not: "A holistic ecosystem of synergy."

Accessibility

• Contrast: white on black and black on yellow pass AA. Avoid white on yellow or purple text on black for body sizes — fails contrast.
• Min body text: 14px on screen; never set long copy in all-caps.
• Motion: respect prefers-reduced-motion — orb animations are decorative and must be skippable.
• Alt text: every published asset ships with descriptive alt text.

Files & Naming

One source of truth: this portal. Pull source files from the Library, don't pass around screenshots.

Naming convention

OutliersSummit_[Asset]_[Variant]_[Color]_v[N].[ext]
e.g. OutliersSummit_Logo_Horizontal_White_v1.svg · OutliersSummit_Badge_Speaker_v2.png