title: "Voice and boundaries — Born Free" project: born-free tags: [style-guide, voice, boundaries, born-free] date: 2026-04-23

1. Audience (one paragraph each)

• Who we help: We speak to people building culture, community, and independent creative work who want a credible home for their project—especially where ownership, distribution, and long-term trust matter. [NEEDS HUMAN CONFIRMATION: exact primary ICP and flagship surface (e.g. site sections, product lines).]
• What they already believe: They believe artists and communities deserve real leverage, not rented attention. They are open to new rails (including on-chain) when the story is clear and the tradeoffs are honest.
• What they fear or are tired of: They are tired of hype, rug-pull language, and “revolutionary” adjectives. They fear being associated with scams, empty promises, or anything that makes serious collaborators walk away.

2. Positioning (one short paragraph)

• One-sentence promise: Born Free is the umbrella under which we build and communicate trustworthy tools and stories for independent culture—with calm clarity, not noise. [NEEDS HUMAN CONFIRMATION: tighten to your canonical one-liner.]
• What we are NOT (anti-positioning): We are not a get-rich ecosystem, a substitute for legal or tax advice, or a brand that trashes people to look edgy. We do not imply guaranteed outcomes for any financial or creative bet.

3. Voice (how we sound)

• Speak in plain, direct sentences; prefer clarity over charisma.
• Name specifics (what changed, who it is for) instead of superlatives.
• Stay calm; excitement comes from real milestones, not exclamation points.
• Use inclusive, respectful language; credit contributors and source material.
• Acknowledge tradeoffs when we touch custody, blockchains, or rights—no fairy tales.
• Avoid empty trend words; if we use a term of art, define it once in context.
• Tone: grounded, human, build-focused—not alarmist, not “degens only.”
• When unsure, say what we know and what still needs validation.

Good (on-brand) examples

• We ship tools and stories for people who own their work—without turning community into a sales funnel.
• Here is what is live today, what is in progress, and what we are not building next quarter.
• If you custody assets on-chain, you carry real responsibility; we will point to accurate docs, not shortcuts.

Bad (avoid)

• The entire industry is about to be disrupted—miss this and you are ngmi.
• This is the only platform you will ever need, guaranteed to change your life.
• Trust us, we are all going to make it; just ape in.

4. Vocabulary

• We prefer: community, independence, clear ownership, roadmap, release, update, rights, responsibility, opt-in, documented behavior.
• We avoid: guaranteed, moon, Lambo, ser, WAGMI in external copy; vague “decentralized everything”; insults and pile-on memes in official channels.
• Names: Born Free in prose; project slug and filters born-free. When we mention sub-products, follow their official spellings: Store Free (store-free), Knowtation (knowtation).

5. Claims and boundaries (non-negotiable)

• We do not promise investment returns, legal outcomes, tax results, or medical effects.
• We do not invent metrics, case study numbers, or testimonials; we cite verifiable sources or label projections as such.
• When we discuss blockchain, custody, or compliance, we keep language accurate and measured; we suggest qualified professionals for advice on law, tax, or securities. [NEEDS HUMAN CONFIRMATION: any regulated-activity list your counsel requires.]
• We criticize ideas and practices, not individuals; we avoid defamatory or harassing phrasing, including toward competitors or critics.

6. CTAs and urgency

• Allowed urgency: real dates (e.g. ticket or screening windows, campaign end, documented promotion sunset), limited capacity that we can show is true, honest “last chance” tied to a stated deadline.
• Forbidden urgency: fake countdowns, false scarcity, hidden renewals, manipulative FOMO, or “you will lose out forever” without a factual basis.

7. AI and disclosure

• When public content is substantively drafted or edited by AI, or when media is synthetic (image, audio, video), we disclose in line with platform and jurisdiction rules and with our own channel policies.
• A human reviews facts, names, numbers, and compliance-sensitive statements before publish. AI output is a draft, not a substitute for sign-off. [NEEDS HUMAN CONFIRMATION: your legal/marketing approver and workflow.]

8. Review checklist (10 yes/no items)

1. [ ] Is every factual claim either sourced, in-app verifiable, or removed?
2. [ ] Have we avoided investment/legal/medical promises we cannot back up?
3. [ ] Are product names and capitalization correct (Born Free, sub-product names as listed)?
4. [ ] If we mention blockchain, custody, or compliance, is the phrasing accurate and non-misleading?
5. [ ] Is urgency honest (real date or real constraint)?
6. [ ] Are we criticizing ideas, not attacking people or entities by name in an abusive way?
7. [ ] Have we removed hype adjectives in favor of specifics?
8. [ ] If AI or synthetic media is involved, is disclosure handled for this channel?
9. [ ] Has a human who can approve copy reviewed claims and offers?
10. [ ] Is the CTA clear and the next step honest about what the reader gets?