Vibe coding broke people's brains because they had a bad understanding of the software design process.
The pop culture model goes something like this: start out with a sketch and then render that same idea in progressively finer detail.
So when tools could "skip" to high detail, people went WOW.
This is a good principle for design in general:
When users tell you there's a problem, they are usually right.
When users tell you how to fix it, they are usually wrong.
(bonus: if you replace "user" with "stakeholder" this still applies)
Could you do any UR where you get folks to show you how they’d start..? Or has that maybe come up in previous UR you could take another look at?
Reminder that the Call for Sessions for September's @sdingov.bsky.social event is open: govservicedesign.net/call-sessions
Conference theme: Democratising Design: sdingov.net/democratisin...
If you know enough to say if it's true, you know too much to tell if it's clear (credit: @cjforms.bsky.social)
If the rumours are true and the kids and social media consultation opens today, here are two things I think should be banned from
social media:
1) AI bots
2) recommendations algorithms that optimise for time on site
Firm regulation of both of these things is possible and auditable
🧵
New post: Can we use 'test and learn' methods in the NHS? What would it take to do so? Long but important! I think this is one of the biiggest delivery questions facing the UK government.
medium.com/@jamestplunk...
Margaret Calvert book uk.bookshop.org/p/books/marg... #Design embedded across the UK for #Wayfinding
I got it as a Valentine’s gift ❤️
In September, I was asked to give some thoughts about the NHS 10-year plan based on some of the principles in Platformland. Here are the slides and speaker notes:
www.rpp.works/ways-of-d…
Several European countries are considering social media bans for children. We must regulate platforms, not children.
I urge caution:
✅ Focus on "safety by design"
✅ Demand algorithmic transparency
✅ Enforce the #DSA & #HumanRights standards
Read my Shout Out👇
www.coe.int/en/web/commi...
You often hear "software development is changing, and we must adapt" because of Claude Code.
But for my entire career, code has been the *easiest* part of making shit people care about, and we still haven't adapted.
The easier coding becomes, the less often we ask "do users actually NEED this?"
They can be useful: as folks have discussed below assumptive/proto personas for getting teams to think about different types of user. Personas based on research can be useful for representing different mental models and user needs, esp if you have users with competing needs
This is ace. An NHS video that explains what user research is, aimed at mammographers, to recruit more research participants to a redesigned breast screening service. A brilliant way of explaining UR to people wary of unusable IT systems forced upon them.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zM9...
I can’t make this year, but I had a great time at the NHS hack day last year
There was also some interesting stuff about metrics and qual needing context when quant doesn’t. I prob need to relisten, but it’s making me think about design research in areas where quant is king (eg health)…
Another day, another Ipsos survey that uses gender as a lens on public attitudes to science without taking into consideration that 1 in 8 British men think they could win a tennis point against Serena Williams www.britishscienceassociation.org/News/public-...
Why would they do that?!? Sparkly buttons are never good
One of the best takes on non-sensical product and service developments:
“Protobot is very simple: it generates a product idea by matching a random product category with a random constraint.”
— by the great Molly Claire Wilson:
protobot.org#en
He’s Enormous and a bit too fighty, but we love him!
Photo of a black cat called Wilbur curled up into a circle
Wilbur
£2k when they say “yourself” instead of “you”
I would like the Connections Bot to do a breakdown of how easy the puzzle was by geographical location eg “easy, but only if you’re in America”
Inevitable Christmas post 🎄https://www.instagram.com/p/DSp5-m4Cs3H/?igsh=MTh1NzNvNXZkbDdmYg==
Yay! 🏆
Nope! Clue: from your second post
1/2 Right on Susanna Clarke…
Two intersections this year! (I am not really a sci-fi nerd)
