We have a lot to wrestle with.

August 3, 2018 Newsletter

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Racist

On Friday, August 17th I deactivated my Twitter account. This was a personal decision. I couldn’t be a party to a company that would grant safe haven to a monster who harassed the parents of murdered children. There are many nuanced decisions we have to make in life. That wasn’t one of them. I also couldn’t remember the last time I used the service and got something positive out of it. And yeah, part of that was on me, because I chose to use it as a way to engage with the company itself. But mostly it’s because that’s what Twitter is now. A giant river of shit and panic.

I’m looking forward to spending my time in better ways. Reading. Writing. Possibly talking to people in real life.

Perhaps the idea of a giant stream of information at a global level is impossible to pull off. It certainly seems the case right now. I think the future of social media is small trusted private groups where everyone knows each other, or at least someone can vouch for everyone. Maybe we don’t need to know what everyone is thinking all the time. We certainly don’t need any more insight into the daily thoughts of Nazis.​

— Mike Monteiro (@monteiro)

Ethics, Design, and the Triple Storyline

Everything seems to be coming up ethics lately, and that’s a good thing. We have a lot to wrestle with.

Our Design Ethics workshop last month in Mule Gallery was fantastic. We had folks from established software companies, start-ups, consultancies, and non-profits. Thanks to all of you who attended. If you are interested in bringing something like this to your company, let us know.

James and Per at UX Podcast discussed the piece in their latest show and added some good insights. So, you can save yourself a long read and listen to them.

— Erika Hall (@mulegirl)

Towards Continuous Learning

In tech, there’s an unrelenting stream of approaches and tactics for innovation. For me, the ones that have been the most helpful all began out of specific practices.

Martin Fowler’s continuous integration began as a software development practice. Continuous improvement came out of quality assurance and Toyota’s five why’s. Toolsets and specific implementations aside, what’s most helpful about continuous integration and continuous improvement is that they provide frameworks for teams to work towards.

At Mule, we work towards continuous learning.

Continuous learning starts with research. But the goal of our research is to make evidence-based design decisions. Sharing and applying what we’ve learned can be difficult, especially when we’re working with cross-disciplinary teams. But we save a lot of time and money by using engagement paths to articulate what’s meaningful for the users of the design systems we create.

Next month, we’re hosting a morning workshop to walk through this approach. Bring your whole team! The beauty of engagement paths is that everyone can participate. Sign up here.

— Larisa Berger (@berglar)

We Love Love

We have the conversations we want you to hear on the Voice of Design. Are you listening? On the last episode, game designer and author Amy Jo Kim schooled us on Game Thinking and why some clients just don’t make the cut. Coming up this week, we talk to a design author we love from the DC area.

Walk through the fire and say hi on the Twitter.

— Voice of Design (@VOD_rocks)

In The Gallery

Group show, But Where Are You Really From? is still in the gallery until August 31st! It features a ton of fantastic colorful work from a diverse bunch of sign painters. Follow @butwherereally and @mulegallery on Instagram to learn more about the artists and their pieces. We’ve also got a couple more fun events coming up, including another Drink & Draw this Wednesday, August 22nd and a closing reception on Friday, August 31st.

Our next exhibition showcases the work of painter and printmaker, Gina M. Contreras. Titled Loud voices in tiny spaces, this show will feature a series of paintings about the spaces Contreras has occupied throughout her life. The opening party is Friday, September 14th, 6–9pm. Mark your calendars!