Latest / The Feed & The Thread / The Feed & The Thread - September 20, 2026

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The Feed & The Thread - September 20, 2026 · The Feed & The Thread

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  The standard App Store button is disappearing from websites. So
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  designers are just making their own custom buttons. They are,
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  and the data shows users trust the generic one more.
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  Welcome to The Feed and The Thread, brought to you by
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  Chicago Camps. Leadership By Design is on Thursday and
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  Friday, September 17 and 18 and tickets are available now! And
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  while you're at it, get caught up on UX fundamentals with five
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  minute UX at five em UX dot com. The Feed & The Thread is
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  available online at feed and thread dot com to submit your
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  feeds, or download our app for all the feeds and threads
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  delivered right to your pocket.
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  There's a persistent tension in product development between the
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  data we collect and the beliefs we hold. We often mistake
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  intuition for insight, or assume that standardized design
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  patterns still govern our industry. Today's stories
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  challenge both assumptions. Adir SL at UX Design.cc explores
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  this shift in "Whatever happened to “Download on the App Store”
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  buttons?", noting that the disappearance of mandatory App
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  Store buttons reflects a broader loosening of platform control.
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  Since Apple updated its guidelines in twenty-thirteen,
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  developers have replaced rigid, standardized assets with custom,
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  brand-aligned calls to action. This change signifies a move
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  away from uniformity toward flexible, brand-specific design
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  choices. The standardized button is gone, but the trust it
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  provided remains a design challenge. Dora Czerna examines
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  the tension between empirical data and executive intuition in
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  "The evidence at work", specifically regarding return-
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  to-office mandates. The article highlights an instance where an
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  SVP admitted to lacking data, relying instead on a subjective
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  belief that office work was better. This anecdotal
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  justification contrasts sharply with the hard metrics we expect
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  in corporate decision-making. When leaders prioritize belief
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  over evidence, the entire research process loses its
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  authority. Anders Nielsen at Baymard Institute presents a B2B
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  Medical and Pharma UX benchmark in "B2B Medical & Pharma UX
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  Benchmark: 3,400+ Performance Scores and 2,600+ Best Practice
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  Examples", based on over three thousand four hundred
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  performance scores. The study finds that half of the major
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  players are rated as poor, and the other half as mediocre, with
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  no company achieving a good rating. This widespread lack of
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  usability in specialized e-commerce sites reveals a
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  significant gap in user-centered design. If half the market fails
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  basic usability, the standard for "acceptable" UX needs a
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  serious re-evaluation. Other reads available from UX
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  Design.cc on Shakespeare and AI, and on designing for the
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  designless.
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  The specific ask is how to make software look expensive, not
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  just functional. This question appears in three different forms
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  today, and the answer is becoming less about pixels and
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  more about intent. Over on r/UI_Design, a developer is
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  building a recording studio app and seeking feedback to achieve
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  a premium feel. They're relying on AI tools and community input
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  to fill a gap where a clear design vision should be. The
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  tension here's that we often mistake the output of a
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  generator for the result of a decision. If you don't know why
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  a button is rounded, the AI can't make it feel premium. It
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  can only make it look average. In r/UI_Design, another thread
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  asks for specific agent rules to stop mobile interfaces from
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  looking AI-generated. They want technical workflows that enforce
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  Apple HIG or Material Design standards. This is a reaction to
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  the homogenization of design. When everyone uses the same
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  default models, the interface becomes a commodity.
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  Distinctiveness now comes from knowing exactly which standard
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  to break, and why. Over on r/Design, a graduate is
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  struggling with the time cost of creating realistic perfume
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  bottle mockups. They're considering building their own
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  three-dimensional assets to create a consistent portfolio.
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  This is a practical pivot. When the tooling is inefficient, the
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  professional advantage shifts to the person who owns the asset.
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  It's no longer about who can prompt the best image, but who
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  can build the system that generates it. The common thread
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  is that we're moving from asking what looks good to defining
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  what's intentional.
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  Chicago Camps is hosting Leadership By Design on Thursday
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  & Friday, September 17 & 18. It's an online event, so you can
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  join from anywhere in the world! Tickets are free, thanks to the
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  generosity of the community! If it's within your budget, you can
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  purchase a general admission ticket for only twenty six
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  dollars - with limited early bird tickets at only fifteen
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  dollars. Get tickets now at Chicago Camps dot org.
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  There's a disconnect in the current industry conversation
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  that needs addressing, specifically regarding the
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  Baymard Institute's new B2B Medical and Pharma UX Benchmark.
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  The data is stark, with over three thousand four hundred
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  performance scores showing that half the major players are rated
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  as poor, and the other half as mediocre. That statistic
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  actually validates a feeling many of us have in the
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  community, particularly in the threads about making software
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  look expensive. When half the market fails basic usability,
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  the bar for what's considered acceptable has dropped so low
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  that just following the rules feels like a victory. We're
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  treating compliance with Apple HIG or Material Design as the
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  ceiling, when it should be the floor. And that's where the
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  logic breaks down. If we define our standards by the median,
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  we're essentially designing for the average failure. The fact
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  that no company in that specialized e-commerce sector
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  achieved a good rating suggests that the problem is a lack of
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  intent. We're relying on standardized guidelines to save
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  us, but those guidelines are only as good as the thinking
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  behind them. Exactly. And this is where the practitioner
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  reality hits hard. In the design communities, people are asking
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  for agent rules to stop interfaces from looking AI-
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  generated, which is a reaction to that very homogenization. But
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  the solution is to understand why a rule exists and then
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  decide if that reason still applies to your specific
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  context. So the shift is from asking what looks good to
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  defining what's intentional. In the medical and pharma space,
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  where the stakes are high, intentionality is a requirement.
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  The gap between mediocre and good is about understanding the
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  user's need in a way that the standard guidelines simply don't
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  capture. And that's where the real opportunity lies. The field
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  needs to stop treating design systems as a safety net and
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  start treating them as a starting point. The standard for
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  acceptable UX is a baseline that we have collectively agreed to
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  ignore. If we accept that the median is mediocre, then the
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  work of distinguishing ourselves is about demonstrating a deeper
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  understanding of the problem. The most valuable skill right
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  now is knowing when to build a different one.
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  That's The Feed and The Thread for today. We'll catch you next
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  time!