Friday Links: Design Edition

Skyler Balbus
Aug 25, 2017 · 3 min read
Thinking about type this week. Photo by Alex Read on Unsplash

Hello friends and welcome to the end of August! This week’s eclipse has come and gone (hopefully you weren’t blinded, but you can use this handy test to find out), and now we’re looking forward to the weekend — and the design links to kick it off:

  1. Who knew the end of the summer was the best time to launch a new logo? Pinterest and Medium, apparently. While we’re not totally feeling the new Pinterest logo (we were pretty sure that it meant Pinterest had been acquired by Target — spoiler alert: it hasn’t), we’re interested in Armin Vit’s theory that “this is an effort to position Pinterest as a viable alternative or complement to Twitter/Facebook/Instagram for corporations to use as a platform instead of it just being a mood board for teenagers to redecorate their room.” (Personally, I’m all about tools that help teenagers do whatever they want to do, but it’s understandable that Pinterest might want a broader audience for its product.) And our designer Will Denton has the sharpest eyes for type: he identified the typeface Medium based their new logo on well before they released their official statement on the mark. We’re not sure whether the triangular serifs will make people more or less likely to clap, but I’m sure we’ll find out. (via Will Denton and Matt Quintanilla)
  2. It’s not even September yet, but I’ve been having a surprising number of conversations about Halloween costumes lately. (Have you, too? Is this a thing??) The best one I’ve heard so far is a couples’ costume idea, where you both go as individual letters — but combine as a ligature. This is all a long lead-up to say that we really loved this article about hacking flourishes (including smart quotes, em-dashes, and, of course, ligatures) into your fonts — hopefully not just for Halloween. (via Matt Quintanilla)
  3. If you’re not following Julie Zhuo’s newsletter, The Looking Glass, you’re missing out. This week, she answered a reader’s question about performance and feedback, which is relevant to anyone working on a team, whether you do design or not. We particularly appreciated her perspective on “over-correcting for weakness”, which we’re aiming to keep in mind for our weekly 1:1s. (via Neil Renicker)
  4. This week we came across Quartz’s article, “Designers are using “dark UX” to turn you into a sleep-deprived internet addict”, and had a lot of feelings (and some choice burns / hot takes). After getting over our initial misunderstanding that this would be an article about Night Mode UI, we were pretty unimpressed with the tone of this article and its suggestion that designers are simultaneously the shadowy cabal in charge of making people addicted to technology — and yet also totally powerless against the demands of PMs and clients who just want their numbers to go up. That said, we did appreciate the article’s mention of BJ Fogg and his work at the Stanford Persuasive Tech Lab, which we’d love to take a team field trip to someday! (hot takes via Matt Quintanilla, Matthew Famularo, & Skyler Balbus)
  5. And speaking of field trips: Last week, I represented Postlight at A-B-Z-TXT in Toronto, which was an incredible four days of talks and workshops about the role of typography in culture and technology. I highly recommend checking out the #abztxt hashtag on Twitter, and if you’re in the mood for a deeper dive, sit down with this piece by A-B-Z co-founder Michèle Champagne about handwriting, design, humanity, and how to get the print and digital design kids to play nice together.

Now go forth, enjoy Friday, and may the hottest take you have this weekend be that moment you try to pick up your shoes at the beach after leaving them in the sun all day.

)

Thanks to Matt Quintanilla

Skyler Balbus

Written by

lead product designer at http://postlight.com/ // cofounder of http://extra-mural.com // internet fan

Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade