Ideas and Discoveries
Personal and professional notes about our craft, technique, and the role of design in the world.
events & workshops
Workshop: Craft AI-Powered Experiences with Sentient Design
Reserve a private workshop to teach your product and design teams to imagine, design, and deliver AI-powered features and products.
design system
“The Design System Isn't Working for Me!”
What’s going on when a design system’s can’t get it to do what they need? How to manage bugs, missing features, intentional design deviations, new patterns, and more.
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What we’re reading
When Combinations of Humans and A.I. are Useful
A research study raises challenging questions about collaborative AI interfaces, including the value of “human in the loop” interfaces and explanations of AI logic and confidence scores.
This AI Pioneer Thinks AI Is Dumber Than a Cat
AI pioneer Yann LeCun reminds us that just because LLMs are good at language doesn’t mean that they’re smart.
Beware of Botshit
Botshit is hallucinated content that makes its way into human communications or screws up decision making.
A Radically Adaptive World Model
A research project generates a world based on Counter-Strike, frame by frame in response to your actions. What happens when you apply the same thinking to the design of websites, dashboards, or canvas apps?
Exploring the AI Solution Space
Jorge Arango explores what it means for machine intelligence to be “used well” and, in particular, questions the current fascination with general-purpose, open-ended chat interfaces.
Introducing Generative Canvas
Salesforce is piloting a radically adaptive, AI-mediated dashboard for CRM users. Look out, enterprise, here comes Sentient Design.
Recent Writing
icons
Your Sparkles Are Fizzling
Let’s retire the sparkle emoji, purple hues, and rainbow gradients for AI-powered features.
sentient design
Data Whisperers, Pinocchios, and Sentient Design
Podcasts from PDFs! Working code from pen-and-paper sketches! Discover the new AI-powered design patterns that liberate content from frozen formats—and create new experience paradigms.
ai
The Already-Here Future of Prototyping
With LLM tools like ChatGPT and Claude, it’s easier than ever for anyone — including and perhaps especially non-developers — to develop ideas in code.
sentient design
Say Hello to Sentient Design
Sentient Design is the already-here future of intelligent interfaces and AI-mediated experiences. Discover this framework and philosophy for working with AI as a design material.
sentient design
The Shape of Sentient Design
Use this diagram to think through and explore AI-mediated experiences in your product design.
sentient design
Has the “AI Edge” Become a Dull Blade?
Today’s cutting-edge technology is becoming tomorrow’s ho-hum office tool. And that’s a good thing.
future
The Future is Built on Solid Foundations
Stability and innovation can sometimes seem to be in tension, but they are more complementary than competitive. Consider AI and design systems.
ai
AI and Design Systems
The new crop of AI tools are already supercharging design system efforts across many categories, and we’re helping our clients use AI to do exactly that. Big Medium’s Brad Frost, Kevin Coyle, and Ian Frost show how.
design system
The Art of Design System Recipes
Recipes take a design system’s components and make delicious, product-specific compositions out of them. Brad Frost breaks down the art of wielding recipes for digital UI success.
process
Ship Faster by Building Design Systems Slower
Successful design systems can and should move more slowly than the products they support—but a deliberate pace doesn’t have to create bottlenecks. Josh Clark shows how to reconcile the needs and speeds of product versus design system.