A designer complaining that their job is full of “solved problems” is like a doctor saying they only want to treat novel diseases. The job is mostly not finding new cures. It’s helping teams adopt what’s likely to help in their context.

The complexity of the meeting room’s a/v setup is inversely correlated with the likelihood of everything working.

A SaaS company that decides to 10x my subscription cost vastly overestimates their importance in my life.

The state of enterprise software in 2026

hey, this is a fairly nerdy news item, but you should absolutely know about it. (looks like there are links in other posts in the thread.) the Post Office is really contemplating not delivering ballots unless states expose their voters' data to DOJ. I hate saying read that again but, read it again

Unbreaking@unbreaking.org · 2mo ago

The USPS’s proposed rule—which among other things will force it to *refuse to deliver ballots* for states that don’t fork over their voter rolls to the White House—drew opposition from congressional Democrats, the NAACP, and its own union.

california is gonna have so many mail in ballots that don’t get counted because people don’t know the new USPS rules that are impacting mail in voting. tl;dr don’t put your ballot in the mail today, find a ballot drop box. www.kqed.org/news/1208537...

Still Need to Mail Your Primary Ballot? Don’t Rely on USPS, Officials Say | KQED

State officials are warning that some ballots mailed too close to Election Day might not be counted. Here are other recommended ways to submit your ballot instead.

kqed.org

Enabling micromanagement at scale

Justin Hendrix@justinhendrix.bsky.social · 4mo ago

"Meta is building an artificial intelligence version of Mark Zuckerberg that can engage with employees in his stead, as part of a broader push to remake the Big Tech company around AI."

The designer’s role will always be evolving, but it’s obviously still needed. 🙈

hallo, I am hiring again! - SF Digital Services is looking for a new Engineering Director careers.sf.gov/role/?id=374... This reports directly to me, & I’m looking for a practical & flexible technical expert with excellent communication & coaching skills, who is excited to do both. More below...

Engineering Director - Digital Services (0932)

The Office of the City Administrator and its 25+ divisions and departments operate core internal and public-facing services in San Francisco.   The Office of the City Administrator’s Mission and Visio...

careers.sf.gov

My book, Accessibility For Everyone, is now free and online as a website. accessibilityforeveryone.site The book was first published by A Book Apart in 2017 but it holds up! It covers web accessibility for designers, developers, content folks, and really everyone who works in tech.

Accessibility For Everyone by Laura Kalbag

Read the book online for free.

accessibilityforeveryone.site

Someone must have told their PMs to AI-all-the-things, because my remote light switches now offer hearty winter soup recipes and evening exercise routines.

Why did the Google Maps team make audible driving directions less usable recently? “Go past Irrelevant Road, then take your second left onto Correct Street toward Another Irrelevant Road.” Let me guess—LLM creep? Increasing driver cognitive load is a safety issue.

Hey authors! Check to see if Anthropic stole your book to train their slop generator on. You’re entitled to $1500 per stolen Work. Look up your work, and if you’re in the database, file a claim secure.anthropiccopyrightsettlement.com/lookup/

Managing all the different apps where everyone wants to share their AI meeting notes seems more annoying than just…taking notes?

iOS26 promoting its visual style updates 🥱 instead of celebrating that it can finally screen text messages

Almost every time I teach interview data analysis, someone asks if they can use software to automate it. The point is to understand the data, not to produce a report. Learning takes time and messiness.

“Simple mode: A simplified app for older adults.” Seriously? Just admit you’ve crammed too much poorly-organized garbage into your app, instead of building ageism into your UI.

The whole thing is dreadful for so many reasons, but 288 accessibility issues on a one-page site? Apparently this is “America by design”

Anna E. Cook@annaecook.com · 12mo ago

Normally when I share accessibility bugs I do it for two reasons: 1. Good faith that the company will fix the issue 2. The company won't fix the issue and the public should pay attention. This time, I will look at America by Design for a new reason: rage. Automated test: 288 accessibility bugs

Google: You really should let us automate your Nest thermostat & save the planet. Also Google: Here, try another AI feature you don’t need.

As I’ve said before: Whether your org cares about design doesn’t matter nearly as much as whether they care about humans.

How Empathy Became a Threat

nytimes.com

if you care about government tech, OR about your data & who has it, this is really something

chris xu@chrysaora.bsky.social · last yr.

@unbreaking.org has put together a timeline of things that has happened around data security (of your personal data that the federal government has) since January and you may need a break or two to get through it 😭

Noooooooo is is too early for Christmas ads

It’s like they’re trying to see how many usability issues they can pack into a single form field

“The designers come in at the end, to make sure it matches the style guide”

I’ve yet to see much discussion of how forcing someone else to deal with your bot sends a strong “I have more power / status” signal www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2...

No one likes meetings. They’re sending their AI note takers instead.

Artificial intelligence apps that record and summarize meetings can tempt workers into skipping calls, leaving humans who join in the company of silent bots.

washingtonpost.com

There will always be debate about the boundaries of product vs. user responsibility, but some of these LLM use cases are like building a lawnmower with exposed blades

KJ Charles@kjcharleswriter.com · last yr.

I just received a contract on Docusign for review and signing, and it offered to give me an AI-generated summary that I could read instead to save time. That's AN AI-GENERATED SUMMARY ***OF A CONTRACT***, in case you need to let that sink in.

I am not a fangirl about many people, but Tressie McMillan Cottom is such a brilliant observer of culture, politics, & human nature

Tressie McMillan Cottom@tressiemcphd.bsky.social · last yr.

This is hands down the best, most enjoyable, and far-ranging discussion that I have had in recent memory. Katie brought so much to this interview about vibecessions, “finance guy” memes as politics of social reproduction in casino capitalism, Bama Rush and DSA. moneywithkatie.com/status-power...

Even our little town had a strong showing #nokings

Sure, @nytimes.com, let’s treat the unraveling of democratic norms like a DK Eyewitness book

Love this take on the California state flag.

GeekFilter 🏳️‍🌈🐻@geekfilter.bsky.social · last yr.

When I am stressed and scared & feel helpless (also rage)I channel that into art. I did this early today before the Marines were called in against American citizens. #California #LosAngeles