Liz Myers

If you’re an AI nerd like me you’ll enjoy reading this article about how large language models actually work. If you’re think ‘why should I care?’ about all of this AI models largely work on a black box basis - we train them, prompt them and get something out without having any real idea about how that answer was arrived at. This article opens that black box a little and shines a light on how these models work. https://lnkd.in/gmVA89xE The image is a map of how Anthropics LLM clusters ‘similar’ concepts.

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Tomorrow I'll give a presentation on design quality at Front-end Conf here in Florida. This is the first time I've spoken on such a topic in a live, public format. Here at the event I've been humbled to hear several people say "I'm excited for your talk." Quietly in my head I'm replying "Me too. I have no idea how this will turn out!" Par for the course with new material. 😎 I've said before that my benchmark is 1 hour of prep time per 1 minute of speaking time for a new talk. This is a 45-min talk and I'm on pace for ~45 hrs of prep time. I won't have all the answers tomorrow but we'll explore: – What is design quality anyway? – Why is it so hard to achieve? – Where do we go from here? This is dialog I hope to see more of in the industry. It's long overdue. I'm holding myself accountable to share more, too. Let's see how tomorrow goes first. #frontendconf

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Products like Recraft are like the Perplexity for creating images with #GenAI. They are leaning into the benefits of going beyond a conversational prompt-based interface ONLY and integrating traditional, familiar GUI-based workflows with prompts to provide outcomes that creative people seek. In this example, they've notably improved the experience of creating multiple #images in a consistent style using #AI. In addition, they seem to be among the few (only one?) offering SVG export, making them a great option for #illustration. https://lnkd.in/eiGPqbKU

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That pesky ECDSA signature refuses to go away, and we are struggling with it in a distributed world of trust. Luckily EdDSA is much more scalable, and now used in many distributed signature applications (and where we can split the private key up into secret shares and distribute them over several nodes). But we have a problem ... elliptic curve methods are going to be cracked by quantum computers. So can we take our PQC signature methods and scale them to distributed signatures? Well, no, as Dilithium doesn't support it. But Raccoon can, and also has better side channel resistance (and with a similar performance and key size to Dilithium. So, meet Raccoon: https://lnkd.in/d2QMHSM9

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It tickles me how folks say something today (because they run in narrow and overly-biased circles usually) as if nobody's said it before. I've been addressing how folks suppressed and ignored information architecture for YEARS!!!!! IA is at the CENTER of the user experience, due to what it produces, but many are completely unfamiliar with IA and its benefits AND many supposed educational resources barely scratch the surface on this topic, if they mention it at all. Information architecture is a critical part of user-centered design. Optimal user experiences can't be designed without it. Resharing my Tech Circus talk from 2020 — "Long Live Information Architecture."

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A breakdown of the visual design and user experience of Dot, my favorite new AI companion app. https://lnkd.in/gPbrq4DU #AI #Dot #App #Review #newcomputer

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For anyone wanting to learn more about how we're working on AI as a design team here at Klaviyo, have a listen to this interview with Alexandra Holness

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In a competitive job market, leveling up your skills is crucial. I highly recommend this course at The Designership - it's a great and inexpensive way to enhance your design abilities. No kickbacks involved. Check it out here: https://lnkd.in/eGfV5kXC #Design #SkillDevelopment #CareerGrowth #productdesign

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I’ve been reading this book, The Loop by Jacob Ward, and highly recommend it to anyone in design or tech. There’s a lot about human nature that we understand, through pattern detection. Unfortunately, those patterns can easily be exploited and over-trusted by the common users and oft, even by professionals, limiting our illusion of choice, for what is seemingly convenience. From our choice in what stories get sold to movie studios, to the content and news that is served to you on the daily - machines are already making these choices. So if lately it’s felt like everything is becoming the same, lackluster and less original, with louder and louder echo chambers, you can thank the machines, and companies leveraging “predictive” models in the fastest way to make a buck, rather than taking care to study the potential negative effects on society. If you have/haven’t read the book, what are some ways you would consider avoiding being stuck in the loop in your life/career? #ai #requiredreading #productdesign #research

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#AI is going across our orgs like wild fire being embedded into every tool we use but specifically after the creative sides of the business. Figma is one popular tool that just introduced AI capabilities into their platform. I came across a pretty good write up from a creative in the industry and his thoughts of what these tools are doing to entry level jobs in the industry. https://lnkd.in/gPfTy5wJ

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Sometimes I get asked why as someone in the design and product areas I end up referring so much about remote work (in terms of policies) and async work (in terms of operations). It's often a matter of leverage, and this of course has more impact the larger the company is. For example, shifting design critique from calls (doesn't scale, creates silos, verbal feedback is not precise, conversations can tail easily) to async posts means automatically documenting decisions, have a clear log of feedback that can be analyzed, have space for tail discussions that can happen, opens up to the whole company. One operational change becomes the conduit for a massive gain in terms of quality of the work, time saved, documentation, and transparency. So if I have to choose... sometimes I end up focusing more on these changes in processes that are universal across the company more than a smaller change that is design specific. It's just more efficient and reaps major advantages.

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Let's talk Design Systems Tokens and the nomenclature of how we approach the naming of our semantic aliases. Repeat after me: "We do not need to make things complicated." 👏 Design Tokens are a guiding compass that leaves a trail of breadcrumbs for others to follow when we are not present. Design Systems allow us to channel that communication pipeline that enables us as Design Systems Operators to bridge that gap between dev, design, and any blockade in between. Frictionless communication begins when we create effective semantic aliases that don't muddy the water of our creations, and keep things simple. Easy to interpret and read. Context based. Smart. Decisive. Digestible. 007 - also known as James Bond. Alias to Semantic. Can be an analogy that is example how we can chunk lamens speak for tokens, in how we need to start developing that inner intuition that will guide us in our design decision making when we become architects of our products craft. Intuition that guides our craft via simplicity. Tokens should be easy to pickup and take from one point of the design lifecycle and place in another area that can be traced back to its origin point. Hence anchoring things to an alias to kill two birds with one stone. Our alias allows us to expand our token into multiple areas touching 2,3,4,5 components erm; areas - all at once.   

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This Meta Developer article outlines a two-step process for merging the Meta Horizon Store (formerly Meta Quest store --> formerly the Oculus Store) with App Lab to make it easier to reach a larger audience (hopefully expanded further by support on headsets from additional manufacturers): 1️⃣ App Lab will become a dedicated subsection of the Meta Horizon Store 2️⃣ In the future, new titles submitted will go directly to the Store, and App Lab will no longer be a separate distribution channel. #Meta #Quest #Horizon #applab https://lnkd.in/gauRQHrB

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It took me many years to embrace the fact that I don't fit squarely into a specific discipline. I'm a web developer who's the son of an art teacher. I don't have a traditional design background, nor do I have a computer science background. "Brick people" have clearly-defined roles and boundaries. I am a "mortar person" who oozes in between all of those bricks, connecting dots and helping disciplines better understand one another. The great news is that both brick _and_ mortar people are needed to create sturdy software. In my opinion, that's one of the most beautiful aspects of digital design and development. https://lnkd.in/eZ42jej3 #design #development #brick #mortar #jobtitles

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DEMYSTIFYING WEB COMPONENTS SERIES Sorry for yelling. Web Components are powerful, but often misunderstood (lack of SSR, styling woes, blah, blah...). At Southleft, we're diving deep into their potential. We're kicking off a blog series on Web Components, starting with SLOTS. Why? They're a game-changer for component flexibility. Our "Understanding Slots" four-part series covers: → Intro to Slots → Advanced Techniques → Best Practices & Styling → Advanced Styling of Slotted Elements If you've been sleeping on slots, it's time to wake up! They're reshaping how we build component architecture. Check it out starting with Part 1: https://lnkd.in/gmFeXvVP What's your take on Web Components? Interested in learning more and possibly using them in your next design system project? Or maybe a refactor of your existing design system? Let's talk! #WebDev #FrontEnd #WebComponents #DesignSystems

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Speaking at conferences is a fantastic way to advance your career. (The practice of presenting, of articulating my thoughts and seeing how they play with an audience, has also helped me immensely in honing my point of view on topics I care about.) If you're thinking about speaking at a conference, you should check this out.

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