ASSETS.md
The MIT license in this repository covers our source code. It does not cover every file in the tree.
Some of the images, icons, fonts, and brand assets here are licensed to Bluesky Social PBC by third parties, or are our trademarks, or are third-party trademarks. We cannot pass those rights on to you. This document identifies them and names who holds them.
The MIT license on our source code is unchanged. This document records rights that Bluesky never held, and therefore could never have granted you.
We updated this file in August 2026 so the repository no longer carries a blanket MIT license with no asset carve-out and forking guidelines that ignored commissioned artwork.
For the assets Bluesky itself owns, we are not treating anyone's past use as bad faith. For the rest we are not the rights holder. The tables below name them. If you have shipped one of these in a fork, the If you are forking checklist is the shortest path to a clean position.
| Where | Rights holder | Our MIT license covers it? | If you fork |
|---|---|---|---|
assets/illustrations/ | Owen D. Pomery, via Brilliant Artists Ltd | No | Replace |
assets/icons/ (top level), Central icon glyphs in bskyembed/assets/ except the Starter Pack mark | Iconists (David & Storm GbR) | No | Source your own |
| Bluesky marks — app icons, logos, favicons | Bluesky Social PBC | No | Replace |
assets/kawaii.png, assets/kawaii_smol.png | @sawaratsuki.bsky.social | No | Replace or remove |
assets/icons/custom_logo_japan.svg | A Bluesky Japan logo contest entrant | No | Replace or remove |
assets/icons/apple_logo.svg | Apple Inc. | No | Rests on your own basis |
assets/icons/android_logo.svg | Google LLC | No | Rests on your own basis |
assets/icons/community/ | Leaflet, Offprint, pckt, Standard.site, Germ Network | No | Rests on your own basis |
assets/fonts/inter/, Inter files in bskyogcard/src/assets/fonts/ | The Inter Project Authors | Separate — OFL 1.1 | Keep, with the notice |
Noto fonts downloaded by bskyogcard/scripts/install-fonts.ts | Adobe, Google LLC, and The Noto Project Authors | Separate — OFL 1.1 | Keep, with the notice |
assets/icons/flags/ | @catamphetamine | Separate — MIT | Keep, with the license |
bskyweb/static/media/MaterialIcons.*.ttf | Google, Inc. | Separate — Apache 2.0 | Keep, with the notice |
assets/images/ | Mixed, and not yet fully documented — see Section 7 | No | Replace or ship without |
Everything in Section 6 is already permissively licensed. It is the largest group of files listed here and it needs no action from you beyond keeping the notices in place.
Assets are scoped by directory wherever possible, so that adding a file to a carved-out directory does not require an edit here. Individual paths are listed only where an asset does not sit in a dedicated directory.
assets/illustrations/
The landing-screen illustration, in light and dark variants (assets/illustrations/illustration-mobile.png and assets/illustrations/illustration-mobile-dark.png), used by src/view/com/auth/SplashScreen.tsx.
Rights holder: Owen D. Pomery, represented by Brilliant Artists Ltd. Bluesky Social PBC commissioned the work and holds a usage license. Copyright remains with the artist. Our license is limited to Bluesky's own products and channels, is exclusive to us, and does not permit us to sublicense the artwork or to distribute modified versions of it.
If you are forking this repository, replace these files. Because our license is exclusive, the artwork is not available for separate third-party licensing while that license runs. Please do not approach the artist or his agent for permission — the constraint is our agreement, not their willingness. If you have already shipped it, contact us and we will help you sort it out rather than leaving you to guess.
See assets/illustrations/README.md.
assets/icons/ (top level), and the Central icon glyphs in bskyembed/assets/, except bskyembed/assets/starterPack.svg
Rights holder: Iconists (David & Storm GbR). The user-interface glyphs come from their Central icon system. Bluesky Social PBC licenses them for use in our own products. That license is for our own use. It does not include the right to pass any rights to the icons on to you.
The fact that we have our own license does not mean that you cannot use these icons. It means that any right you have to use them has to come from Iconists, not us. Licenses are available from iconists.co, and there are openly licensed alternatives if you prefer that.
This section covers every file at the top level of assets/icons/ except those named elsewhere in this document — specifically assets/icons/logomark.svg, assets/icons/newskie.svg, assets/icons/verifiedCheck.svg, assets/icons/verifierCheck.svg, assets/icons/starterPack.svg, assets/icons/starterPack_stroke2_corner0_rounded.svg, assets/icons/custom_logo_japan.svg, assets/icons/apple_logo.svg, and assets/icons/android_logo.svg. The assets/icons/flags/ and assets/icons/community/ subdirectories are covered by Section 6 and Section 5 respectively.
Rights holder: Bluesky Social PBC. Our name, logo, butterfly mark, logotype, and app icons are our trademarks. They are not licensed to you under the MIT license or by this document. Use of them is governed by our Trademark Policy and Brand Guidelines.
You may refer to Bluesky by name to describe interoperability or origin — for example, "a client for Bluesky," or "based on the Bluesky app." You may not use our marks as the identity of your own product or service, or in any way likely to suggest that Bluesky publishes, endorses, or supports it.
assets/app-icons/ — all iOS and Android app icon variants, including the .icon bundlesassets/favicon.pngassets/logo.pngassets/default-avatar.pngassets/icon-android-foreground.pngassets/icon-android-monochrome.pngassets/icon-android-notification.pngassets/splash/splash.pngassets/splash/splash-dark.pngassets/splash/android-splash-logo-white.pngassets/icons/logomark.svgassets/icons/newskie.svgassets/icons/verifiedCheck.svgassets/icons/verifierCheck.svgassets/icons/starterPack.svgassets/icons/starterPack_stroke2_corner0_rounded.svgbskyembed/assets/logo.svgbskyembed/assets/logo_full_name.svgbskyembed/assets/starterPack.svgbskyweb/static/favicon.pngbskyweb/static/favicon-16x16.pngbskyweb/static/favicon-32x32.pngbskyweb/static/apple-touch-icon.pngbskyweb/static/safari-pinned-tab.svgbskyweb/static/social-card-default.pngbskyweb/static/social-card-default-gradient.pngbskyweb/embedr-static/favicon.pngbskyweb/embedr-static/favicon-16x16.pngbskyweb/embedr-static/favicon-32x32.pngmodules/BlueskyClip/Images.xcassets/AppIcon.appiconset/src/view/icons/Logo.tsx, src/view/icons/Logomark.tsx, src/view/icons/LogomarkWithType.tsx, and src/view/icons/Logotype.tsxThese files stay in this repository because the app needs them to build. If you fork, replace them with your own — that is the one thing this section asks of you. Shipping an app that looks like Bluesky is also a problem under the app stores' own rules on copycat apps, quite apart from trademark.
These are third-party artworks that appear in the app with attribution. We hold no license that lets us pass rights to them on to you.
assets/kawaii.png and assets/kawaii_smol.png — rights holder:
@sawaratsuki.bsky.social. Shown as an opt-in variant and credited in src/view/shell/Drawer.tsx and src/view/shell/desktop/RightNav.tsx.assets/icons/custom_logo_japan.svg — rights holder: the entrant who won the Bluesky Japan logo contest.Replace or remove these if you fork. If you want to use them, contact the artist.
These marks belong to other companies. We include them to identify their services in our UI — sign-in buttons, store badges, and links to third-party applications. We are neither granting nor withholding permission, because it is not ours to give. Your use of them rests on your own nominative-use basis or on permission from the mark owner.
assets/icons/apple_logo.svg — Apple Inc.assets/icons/android_logo.svg — Google LLCassets/icons/community/leaflet.svg — Leafletassets/icons/community/offprint.svg — Offprintassets/icons/community/pckt.svg and assets/icons/community/pckt-full.svg — pcktassets/icons/community/standard-site.svg — Standard.siteassets/icons/community/germ_logo.webp — Germ NetworkApple's and Google's marks in particular carry their own brand guidelines governing size, spacing, and permitted contexts. If you ship a sign-in button or a store badge, follow their guidelines.
These are licensed on terms that permit redistribution. Nothing in this document restricts them. We list them so you know they are safe, and so you know to carry their notices. This is the largest group of assets in this document.
| Asset | Path | Rights holder | License | Notice |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inter typeface | assets/fonts/inter/, bskyogcard/src/assets/fonts/Inter-*.ttf | The Inter Project Authors | SIL Open Font License 1.1 | OFL.txt |
| Noto Sans families (OG card service) | Downloaded by bskyogcard/scripts/install-fonts.ts | Adobe, Google LLC, and The Noto Project Authors | SIL Open Font License 1.1 | README.md |
| country-flag-icons | assets/icons/flags/ | @catamphetamine | MIT | LICENSE |
| Material Icons | bskyweb/static/media/MaterialIcons.*.ttf | Google, Inc. | Apache License 2.0 | NOTICE.md |
Build output under bskyweb/static/media/ also contains compiled Inter files. They are the same OFL-licensed typeface, emitted by the web build. The bundled Inter license does not designate a Reserved Font Name.
The OG card build downloads Noto Sans fonts into bskyogcard/src/assets/fonts/ and copies them into its build output. Their copyright notices and OFL text are in bskyogcard/src/assets/fonts/OFL-NOTO.txt. The CJK fonts reserve the name "Source."
See NOTICE.md for the consolidated third-party notices.
assets/images/
Product illustration and announcement imagery — onboarding art, chat backgrounds, feature announcement graphics, and similar.
Rights holder: mixed, and we have not finished documenting it. Some of this is Bluesky's own work. Some was commissioned from outside illustrators, on terms that do not let us pass rights on. We are working out which is which.
Until we have, treat the whole directory as outside the MIT license and not licensed for your use.
When this is resolved, one of two things will happen: this section will name the rights holder for each file, or the directory will be split so that the boundary itself carries the answer. If you need a specific file's status before then, ask us and we will find out.
If you are forking, replace these or ship without them. See assets/images/README.md.
You have our blessing to fork this application. These steps map one-to-one to the sections above.
assets/illustrations/ — commissioned artwork, licensed to Bluesky only. Section 1assets/icons/ is licensed to us for our own use. Section 2src/view/icons/. Section 3assets/images/, or ship without it. Section 7Then change your branding, support links, and analytics as described in the Forking guidelines. That part is not about licensing — it is what makes a fork clearly distinguishable from Bluesky, which matters both for your users and for app store review.
If something in this repository looks like it should be on this list and is not, if a rights holder named here is wrong, or if you are unsure whether an asset is covered, open an issue or email [email protected].
NOTICE.md, per-directory notices, and the required Apache 2.0 and OFL license texts. It documents pre-existing rights; it does not change the MIT license or relicense any file.This document describes the licensing position of assets in this repository. It is not a grant of rights, and it does not modify the MIT license as it applies to source code.