Oversimplified: Volume 136
Creating your AI library, mastering dashboard design, and 28 principles
Hey there đ
Oversimplified is a digest of the best links I stumble upon and any new posts from me. Itâs been a little over two years (!) since the last issue. Iâve been focused on other projects, but I've missed this weekly opportunity to share with you all, so Iâm picking it back up again. Feel free to unsubscribe at the bottom of this email if this is no longer your speed. We all have plenty going on in life, so I wonât take it personally.
âď¸ 28 Principles for 28 Years
Itâs funny that the older I get, the less I believe that I have any worthwhile âprinciplesâ to share with others. Life, happiness, and fulfillment arenât solvable problems. Weâre all just doing our best. So thatâs what this is, a handful of ideas that are helping me do my best, at this specific point, after 28 years on this pale blue dot.
đ Mastering Dashboard Design
I enjoyed this flow chart for thinking through dashboard design from Seoyeon Jun. Itâs easy to shame dashboards, but more often than not, itâs not the fault of the medium but rather the thinking that goes into them. Taking the time to interrogate the âWho,â âWhy,â âWhat,â etc. goes a long way in my experience.
đ How Do You Know When Your Game Is Good?
Iâve been working on some more ambiguous projects in my day-to-day at Metabase recently, and itâs got my mind on the topic of defining success criteria. Stumbling upon this article raised my spirits and sparked some ideas. Itâs interesting how vastly different games all seek signals that the project is âworkingâ in similar ways.
đ Please Stop Saying âJustâ
Iâve been guilty of this. Itâs always felt a little weird qualifying asks with âjustâ but I never thought too much of it. I think this plea from Scott Ringwelski might be enough to steer me away though. Saying âCan we just do Xâ both pre-seeds a solution and implies simplicity, which is especially dangerous when thereâs hidden complexity.
đ My Little Library
We all have workflows, processes, and playbooks that we implicitly run in our day-to-day lives. Now that robots are getting more and more competent, this article from Tomasz Tunguz has got me thinking about how I can leverage the new tools at our disposal and create something of a âlibraryâ for myself. Very cool idea.
đ Typeset in the Future: WALL¡E
If you, like me, think that Pixarâs WALL¡E is a masterpiece, then this fun and deep analysis of the typesets used in the movie is worth checking out. I especially enjoyed all the callbacks to early days tech products.
Food for Thought
I have found that the surest way of seeing the wondrous in something ordinary, something previously underappreciated, is coming to love someone who loves it. â Maria Popova
Until next time
As always, if you're enjoying Oversimplified, I'd love it if you shared it with a friend or two. If anything stood out, whether good or bad, I would love to hear about it. Reply to this email or tweet at me and letâs chat. Feels great to be back. đ
Until next time,
Conor