Latest / The Feed & The Thread / The Feed & The Thread - March 28, 2026

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The Feed & The Thread - March 28, 2026 · The Feed & The Thread

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  Google's new AI tool just sent Figma's stock tumbling. That's
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  wild. So is the design canvas officially dead? Maybe, but the
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  real question is who owns the design now. And part of the
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  answer is that it's never just been Figma jockeys. And that's
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  where the conversation gets interesting. Let's get into it.
• 0:20
  Welcome to The Feed and The Thread, brought to you by
• 0:23
  Chicago Camps. There's an open call for speakers for UX Camp
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  Summer on May 30th, so now is your chance to get on stage and
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  share your ideas! You can use our Proposal Counselor to help
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  you get submitted today. The Feed & The Thread is available
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  right to your pocket.
• 0:48
  Today's Feed lands on a sharp question: if AI decides the
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  interface, who actually owns the design judgment? Google's new
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  Stitch tool reportedly shook Figma's stock, signaling a real
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  market shift. Fabricio Teixeira at UX Design.cc makes this case
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  in "Google Stitch, design maturity guide, livable
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  products," and it challenges us to rethink lovable products in
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  favor of livable ones. That piece warns against outsourcing
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  design thinking to algorithms when long-term user well-being
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  is at stake. Though, to be fair, to call Figma "lovable" with
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  their pricing model and mid customer service is really a
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  stretch. The real tension lies in who holds the decision-making
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  power between the system and the human. Kate Moran at Nielsen
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  Norman Group clarifies this in "GenUI vs. Vibe Coding: Who's
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  Designing?" She argues that while the concepts blur,
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  accountability changes depending on whether AI executes or
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  judges. This distinction matters for execution fidelity and
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  design responsibility. Traditional skills aren't enough
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  anymore if you can't orchestrate AI agents for code generation.
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  Nick Babich writes about this at UX Planet in "Must-Have UX/UI
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  Design Skills for Claude Code." He says designers must translate
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  intent into technical constraints to increase their
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  practical output. Also worth your time today: new work from
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  Codrops, UX Design.cc, and Dan Saffer.
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  Welcome to the Thread, where we're diving into the messy
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  reality of design work today. Over on r/UXResearch, quant
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  researchers are asking if a Data Science masters actually makes
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  you better at the job or just looks good on a resume. The real
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  tension is whether deep statistical training replaces
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  the messy human context that defines good research. Teams
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  might chase credentials while losing the ability to ask the
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  right questions in the first place. Designers on r/UXDesign
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  are debating which tech industry actually needs creative problem
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  solvers right now. The question reveals an anxiety that design
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  is becoming a commodity instead of a strategic necessity. If
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  creativity is only valued in flashy consumer apps, we're
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  missing opportunities in complex sectors like healthcare or
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  logistics. Still in r/UXDesign, folks are trying to figure out
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  which AI tools are worth the learning curve versus the hype.
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  The field is shifting from curiosity to practical
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  integration, forcing us to decide what truly speeds up our
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  workflow. Blindly adopting every new tool just creates more
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  clutter in an already crowded process. Finally, the
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  conversation on r/UXDesign has turned to a worrying flip in
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  demand between product managers and designers. One designer
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  called it infuriating to watch PMs let AI make terrible choices
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  as they take over design work. Another joked about pivoting to
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  just getting AI to write bad Jira tickets. This shift
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  suggests a race to the bottom where execution matters more
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  than empathy. The mood today feels less about innovation and
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  more about holding the line against a devalued craft.
• 3:44
  Chicago Camps is hosting UX Camp Summer on Saturday, May 30th.
• 3:47
  There's an open call for speakers so submit your idea
• 3:50
  today! It's an online event, so you can join from anywhere in
• 3:53
  the world! Tickets are free, thanks to the generosity of the
• 3:56
  community! If it's within your budget, you can purchase a
• 3:58
  general admission ticket for only thirteen dollars and fifty
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  cents. Get tickets now at Chicago Camps dot org.
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  Kate Moran's point about accountability is the real
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  friction here. When AI executes versus when it judges, the
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  responsibility for the final interface shifts completely.
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  That distinction is critical because we're already seeing
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  teams outsource that judgment to tools like Stitch. If the
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  algorithm decides the layout, who's actually liable when the
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  experience fails? It's not just liability. It's about whether we
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  still possess the skill to translate intent into technical
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  constraints when the code generation happens autonomously.
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  And that's where the community is getting messy. People are
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  chasing data science degrees to look smarter, but they're losing
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  the ability to ask the right questions about human context.
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  So the tension isn't about the tools. It's about whether we
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  value the messy human context enough to keep it central when
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  the system tries to optimize it away. Exactly. If we let the
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  system define what livable means, we've already lost the
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  design. The gap isn't between human and machine. It's between
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  who holds the final say on what matters to the user. And right
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  now, that final say is the only thing that actually separates a
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  designer from a prompt engineer.
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  That's The Feed and The Thread for today. We'll catch you next
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  time!