News

Dukhan Bank To Launch Wristband-Based Payment Option

Published

5 years ago

February 18, 2021

dukhan bank to launch wristband-based payment option

VISA

Qatar’s leading retail bank, Dukhan Bank, has recently published a press release, announcing the launch of its new payment platform and companion wristbands that make use of NFC technology to facilitate contactless payment.

Called Dukhan Pay (D-Pay), the new platform is intended to meet customer’s growing demand for digital banking products and services. It can also help curb the spread of the novel coronavirus by providing a safer alternative to traditional payment options.

“The Dukhan Bank wristbands are entering the market at a time when there is an increased demand in safe, contactless payment. In addition to being safe, the wearables facilitate fast and easy transactions using blended technology that is both secure and fashionable,” commended Dukhan Bank.

Dukhan Bank

The wristbands are available in three colors (gray, pink, and blue), and they are compatible with any point-of-sale terminal with support for contactless payments, allowing customers to spend up to 1,500 QAR per day without touching the terminal.

“The initiative falls under D-Pay, a key cornerstone in Dukhan Bank’s digital transformation that seeks to absorb the latest technologies and online banking solutions to make banking simple, safe, and convenient for our customers,” the bank added.

Not long ago, Dukhan Bank launched contactless credit and debit cards. Other banks in the region are being similarly digital-forward. For example, the Qatar National Bank partnered with fitness tracker makers Fitbit and Garmin to enable contactless transactions via their smartwatches.

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Even before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, major retail chains had been adopting various scan and pay solutions to make shopping faster, safer, and more convenient. Airports are now widely adopting self-check kiosks to increase their capacity and reduce the number of transmission vectors for infectious diseases.

Indeed, the future seems to be contactless, and the technology to enable it is already here. The only question that remains to be answered is how well it will be received by customers.

News

Instagram Redraws Its Wordmark And The Internet Reads “Instagzam”

Instagram’s first wordmark refresh in a decade arrives with new fonts, a restrained gradient — and a Reddit verdict of sidegrade.

Published

4 days ago

August 14, 2026

Nour Nasir

Instagram

Although Instagram’s famous camera icon hasn’t changed, the company has refreshed the handwritten wordmark at the top of its app. This is the first redesign we’ve seen in ten years, and one the internet promptly set about renaming.

“The wordmark at the top of the app hasn’t changed in 10 years, so it was time for a refresh,” Instagram head Adam Mosseri wrote in a post on August 13, describing the new version as “cleaner and more modern” while keeping references to the original design.

Instagram says its team explored hundreds of options — all-caps lettering, camera-inspired concepts, even literal handwriting — before returning to script. “Script reflects individuality, so referencing that felt right,” Instagram director of product design Jasmine Probst said in Meta’s announcement. “The new wordmark is bolder and simpler, with touches of unexpectedness. It cues individual expression, a personal voice, both of which have always been core to Instagram”.

The wordmark is part of a broader brand overhaul: an updated Instagram Sans typeface, two new fonts — the hand-drawn Instagram Pen and Instagram Mono — plus refreshed motion and layouts, and more restrained use of the signature gradient. The wordmark is rolling out globally now, with the rest arriving throughout 2026 and beyond.

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The design mixes cursive and print lettering, some characters connected and others floating free. That hybrid approach, combined with unusually shaped “s” and “r” characters, led some users to conclude the logo actually reads “Instagzam”. On the r/logodesign subreddit, one user said the wordmark looked “fan-made,” like something built in Canva; another called it “an unsettling mix of manuscript and cursive”; a third summarized it as a “sidegrade” — or, inevitably, a “zidegrade”.

Not everyone was hostile to the new look. Some found the half-cursive design stylish and surprisingly readable, while others called it an improvement on its predecessor, and one commenter argued Instagram was simply adopting minimalist branding later than everyone else. Either way, the platform now has a refreshed identity, three updated fonts, and an unofficial new pronunciation.