Words that would otherwise be coming out of my mouth

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  1. 23 May, 2024

    Be gone, vile rectangle!

    One day I’ll fulfill my dream of throwing my phone into the ocean*, but for now I’m settling for throwing my phone in my basement. The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt articulates how the potent combination of smartphones and social […]

  2. 22 May, 2024

    Every Sample from Paul’s Boutique by the Beastie Boys

    One of my all-time favorite albums. Fantastic to listen to all of the source material. This video catalogs every borrowed sample from Paul’s Boutique by the Beastie Boys, from the soundtrack to Car Wash to the Sugarhill Gang to the […]

  3. 17 May, 2024

    The age of average (encore) — Alex Murrell

    The age of average (encore) by Alex Murrell is a wild analysis of how the technology landscape has changed the shape of music.  “Media has always shaped music,” the author states, (David Byrne’s How Music Works is a wonderful book […]

  4. 17 May, 2024

    Code & Pixels

    The Code & Pixels podcast is A podcast about turning pixels into code. hosted by Adekunle Oduye & Kelly Harrop. I’m excited to dig into this as there aren’t a ton of resources specific to us front-of-the-front-end developers.

  5. 16 May, 2024

    Generative AI Is Totally Shameless. I Want to Be It

    What I love, more than anything, is the quality that makes AI such a disaster: If it sees a space, it will fill it—with nonsense, with imagined fact, with links to fake websites. It possesses an absolute willingness to spout […]

  6. 07 May, 2024

    Transparent borders

    You Want border-color: transparent, Not border: none by Dave is a great reminder to not remove borders from components for accessibility reasons, especially to better support high contrast mode. border-color: transparent comes in handy for other use cases as well. […]

  7. 03 May, 2024

    The Weather Channel’s Local on the 8’s Throughout The Years

    Our family was raised on The Weather Channel. So much so that Ian became a meteorologist. So this video that steps through the Local on the 8s over the years gives me all the nostalgic feels.

  8. 02 May, 2024

    AI and harm

    Every time I read about how is being applied in the world, this graph immediately pops up in my head: As the potential to do harm increases, there must be a corresponding increase in the level of caution, skepticism, and […]

  9. 29 Apr, 2024

    Don’t put crap in the design system

    One of my favorite Josh lines that’s really stood the test of time and cuts through a lot of noise in a conversation: Don’t put crap in the design system. Josh Clark What is crap? Crap is rushed work, low-quality […]

  10. 25 Apr, 2024

    Design Systems Smashing Magazine Discussion, April 2024

    I had a fantastic time chatting with a group of design system wizards,  Nathan Curtis and Ben Callahan. Geoff Graham did a great job facilitating the conversation, and we covered a lot of ground!

  11. 24 Apr, 2024

    It’s the End of the Web as We Know It

    Here’s a pretty damning read about LLMs’ impact on the web. Just how SEO produced an extremely lucrative-yet-icky industry, optimizing web content for AI models seems inevitable. SEO will morph into LLMO: large-language-model optimization, the incipient industry of manipulating AI-generated […]

  12. 22 Apr, 2024

    The art of design system recipes

    Recipes are a critical — and often misunderstood! — layer in the design system ecosystem. First of all, what exactly are recipes? As the name suggests, recipes combine ingredients to create UI experiences that are complex, delicious, nutritious. The design […]

  13. 10 Apr, 2024

    The Component Gallery

    There have been tons of design system roundup sites over the years, but The Component Gallery  by Iain Bean is particularly well designed and fun.

  14. 10 Apr, 2024

    The Value of Design Tokens in Modern Web Development | Southleft, LLC

    Here’s my pal and frequent collaborator TJ Pitre with The Value of Design Tokens in Modern Web Development. TJ’s post is a good overview of design tokens and the various aspects of working with them in a web development workflow.

  15. 05 Apr, 2024

    Should designers code?

    Ah yes, this old chestnut. It pops up as reliably as daffodils in early spring. My perspective has changed very little over the years. Telling web designers they don't need to worry about code is like telling architects they don't […]

  16. 02 Apr, 2024

    Brad Frost on Adaptable Design Systems | Design Systems Podcast

    I had a great chat with Chris Strahl on the Design Systems Podcast, and we covered a lot of ground! We sit down with Brad Frost, a leading voice in design systems. Together, we explore the critical intersection between adaptable […]

  17. 01 Apr, 2024

    Front-end development’s identity crisis – Elly Loel

    I’m not a “[full-stack] developer”, regardless of what my last job title says. I’m not even a front-end developer, thanks to the JavaScript–industrial complex. I’m a front-of-the-front-end developer, but that’s too long. So, I’m a web designer. And I also […]

  18. 22 Mar, 2024

    People hearing music for the first time

    One video phenomenon that has me enthralled hook, line, and sinker is people hearing music for the first time. Watching vicariously as others experience amazing music for the first time brings me so much joy. Sure, it’s entertaining, but it […]

  19. 22 Mar, 2024

    Deep Dive with Brad Frost — The new frontier of design systems

    If you’ve dabbled in design systems then you’re no doubt familiar with Brad Frost and atomic design. He’s laid the foundation for design systems teams around the world. So in this discussion we talk about the types of challenges he […]

  20. 22 Mar, 2024

    Adactio: Journal—What the world needs

    Here are some beautiful words from Jeremy. So write! Share! Publish! But you know what? Screw what the world needs. If we’re going to be hardnosed about this, then the world doesn’t need any more books. The world doesn’t need […]