Links
A regularly updated collection of things I find worth reading, watching, or listening to. Subscribe via RSS.-
Taste at speed
№ 63As I was finishing up writing a talk for Adyen's Studio Day (on designing and writing with attention and intention, on quality and craft, on taste, and on AI tooling), an email arrived in my inbox. In it was the latest post by Carly Ayres, writer, and previous co-founder of HAWRAF, and it reinforced the line of thinking I'd been on.
She writes about taste, speed and AI and how, while AI may lower the bar to get to a decent first draft of whatever it is you're creating, speed doesn't always indicate progress. Progress may just be movement.
Tools produce polish, but not perspective.
I see many people writing about this at the moment. About how perspective and taste are what can set a good designer apart. About how creative constraints and thoughtful revision are key to an outcome that's good, and not just finished.
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Every day is filled to the brim with appointments, meds, needles, bills and pain. The brushstrokes of my illness are suffocating.
Giorgia Lupi, an information designer, on three years of long Covid. I encountered the piece because it was nominated for a Webby for Best Datavisualization. What has become of her life sounds horrendous; how she has chosen to present that horror, is admirable.
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Fontstand is becoming a cooperative. They will be “owned and governed by independent type foundries” and are committed to creating a “fair, transparent and sustainable platform for font distribution”.
I'm curious to see how this shakes out. They're running a Font User Survey which, if you ever license fonts, you might want to fill out.
As part of the process we are rethinking how fonts are licensed—aiming to design something simpler, clearer, and more intuitive for users—and this is where we need your input. We would like to hear about your experiences using fonts: What works? What’s confusing or frustrating? What would you change? Your answers will help us decide how licensing works within Fontstand Cooperative.
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I recently stumbled upon Dropbox's (new?) brand guidelines, and the site they've put together for it is incredibly well done. Every chapter has its own interactive elements, the animations are perfectly executed, and none of it is overcooked. Impressive!
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From 2019, but as relevant as ever. Matthias Ott on why carving out your own place on the internet is so important.
Building things for your own site is so worthwhile because you are allowed to make mistakes and learn without pressure. If it doesn’t work today, well, maybe it’ll work tomorrow.
I've yet to look into and implement Webmentions and Webrings, and I need to submit my site to a few more directories, but the barriers for me to continue building my own place on the web have definitely been lifted.
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Quality is a trap
№ 58Eric W. Bailey explains why the term “quality” keeps popping up in the design industry and shows how malleable and variable a term it is.
“Pride in craft is always important. Just be sure that the craft is serving objective and constructive concerns.”
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A special episode where Charlie Jermyn recites an essay he wrote for the first issue of TRANSCRIPT Magazine.
The reading is a written documentation of a ten hour experiment conducted in August 2021: a walk from Leiden to Amsterdam in search of creative enlightenment. Each hour is interspersed with music that reflects the landscape and circumstance he found himself in.
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Elliott Jay Stocks, who I've followed ever since he did 8 Faces, shared a great few nerdy typographic nuggets in his talk at Config 2025. Product Designers, take note.
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Looking elsewhere
№ 55Many great thoughts in this article by Robb Owen about craft, intentionality, standards and hype.
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Erin Kissane writes about online spaces and what makes them unbearable and joyful. The post is under her wreckage/salvage moniker, a “tiny studio and display case for small research projects and long-form explorations.”