Viewpoint

Little Projects that have Changed the World Would you take your side projects more seriously if you found out someone would pay you tens of thousands for it? Side projects are much more than simply hobbies, they are indicators of what you are capable of building. In an age where so many people are talkers and so few are doers,… Read More ￫

DESIGN is as important as TECHNOLOGY Today, design is as important as technology. I was meeting with a startup last week when the principal architect asked me why is design more important now than ever before? To answer that, let’s reflect on the evolution of automobile design. When the Model T first came out, the focus was on getting the… Read More ￫

How we approach design sprints at Shopify Over the past few months at Shopify I’ve been running weekly design sprints to kick off new projects and features. If you haven’t heard of a design sprint before, it’s a 3–5 day collaboration of designers, developers, UX researchers, and content strategists where we work together to build several high-fidelity prototypes. We start… Read More ￫

How a remarkable story of a small design studio unwittingly drove an industry to madness. 37Signals successfully navigated the path of going from a design studio to being a software company. In the process of doing that they unknowingly started the mythology that every design or development studio should become a product company. Early in 2005, as their first product,… Read More ￫

A few days ago I had a moment of sheer panic because I couldn’t find a pen. I went through the Elisabeth Kübler-Ross stages of penlessness (Denial: Maybe I don’t need a pen? I don’t need a pen! Anger: Where is my goddamned pen?! Bargaining: If you give me your pen, O nice, accommodating waiter, I’ll leave you a bigger… Read More ￫

‘Frictionless design’ has become synonymous with ‘good design’. User journeys with cognitive and physical barriers that are minimised are on the surface very suited to our busy and distracted lives, it is true. But it is time to acknowledge that frictionless experiences are affecting us, our interpersonal relationships and our societies and not always positively: We are trading a host… Read More ￫

These days, the latest technology goes in and out of style at light speed. It’s enough to make a digital designer wonder how she’ll be prepared for the future and stay competitive and competent in the job market. In fact, “The Future of Work” was the title of the panel I was recently on as part of AIGA’s San Francisco… Read More ￫

Maksim is a product designer from New York and the creator of the popular Design Hunt app. Maksim taught himself how to code, then launched Design Hunt, getting to the top of Product Hunt in the process. Here’s how it all started: What If? It all started with “what if.” What if I can build a mobile first product, for… Read More ￫

Paying for something online with a credit card is simple, right? Yes and no. Yes, because we’ve been doing it since the early days of the Internet (e.g. Amazon), and no, because no two credit card forms are alike. Over the past 20 years, we’ve built a mental model of paying online: I pull out a credit card from my… Read More ￫