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AI+Design Series : Design In Tech Seattle Redux with John Maeda
5 min readMay 26, 2025
Earlier this month, I attended a community event featuring John Maeda, VP of Design and Artificial Intelligence at Microsoft, as part of the AI+Design series hosted by Albert Shum, Ellie Kemery, and David Zager in partnership with Pioneer Square Labs (PSL). Maeda shared insights from his latest Design in Tech report, presenting technical updates about AI and design, and a broader analysis of how AI is changing creative processes.
2025 Design in Tech Report Takeaways
- AI is not replacing designers but transforming how design is done.
- AI experimentation is becoming significantly cheaper and faster.
- The “Agent Era” is shifting AI from models to task-completing agents.
- UX is evolving into AX, reducing UI in favor of direct AI execution.
- AI UX best practices are emerging to improve trust and usability.
- AI automation introduces risks that require responsible governance.
