When it comes to toxic online culture and hate speech, the responsibility of technology companies is a hotly debated issue. As a global ICT company guided by Nordic values, TietoEVRY wanted to enter the public discussion and show that even big companies can take a stand by developing products that have social responsibility coded into them, like the Polite Type. The Polite Type is a font that automatically recognises and rewrites hate speech. With a few changes to the OpenType code, a word database with a replacement function could be integrated into the regular free font file, so that certain negative terms are immediately and automatically replaced with positive ones when they are written. In this way, the company has incorporated its values of inclusion and equality into a product that is available free of charge to a global audience, has been downloaded thousands of times in well over 100 countries, is used by non-governmental organisations and schools, and has generated a huge response in both social and analogue media.
Begründung der Jury
The fact that a global ICT company is participating in and linking its values to the public debate by combating the global phenomenon of hate speech on the internet with a coded OpenType font is absolutely great and outstanding. Negative associations and swear words are immediately transformed into positive ones when written out, so this technologically outstanding typeface not only has an enormous social impact, but also enables the company to realise its mission statement.
Credits
Client:
TietoEVRY, Espoo, Finland
Design:
TBWA\Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
Melvas Type Design, Vantaa, Finland
Project Team:
TBWA\Helsinki: Joona Stedt (Account Management)
Fredrik Stürmer (Art Direction)
Jyrki Poutanen (Creative Direction)
Mikko Pietilä (Creative Direction)
Markus Nieminen (Creative Direction)
Juhana Hokkanen (Digital Concept)
Atso Wilén (Graphic Design)
Iida Sarpaniemi (Graphic Design)
Simone Bocedi (Strategic Planning)
Maria Kuorikoski (Text)
Durch Starten des Videos erklären Sie sich damit einverstanden, dass Daten wie z.B. Ihre IP-Adresse an Vimeo übermittelt werden. vimeo.com/privacy
