A compelling argument regarding interface engineering: solving interface problems that have largely already been solved leads to underdeveloped solutions, because we tying to improve on decades of UX development in the space of few underfunded agile sprints.
To pick a specific example: the problem with an over-engineered form is that the amount of code required to replace no engineering (i.e. native form controls with basic styling) is enormous and almost always only partially successful (i.e. under-engineered).
They are under-engineered because they are over-engineered -- tried to replace native controls.
That said, I don't think it's true that the UX pattern implementations we developers know and love are well-matched for the ever-evolving device landscape.
"Software engineering principles, from Robert C. Martin's book Clean Code, adapted for JavaScript. This is not a style guide. It's a guide to producing readable, reusable, and refactorable software in JavaScript."
The IndieWeb is a social web of independent websites.
And then I stopped laughing, because it's true that many people don't know that they can have a website they own and control. I'm the ultimate hypocrite: giving a hard side-eye to attempts to rekindle interest in blogging, while muttering curses as Facebook prompts me to pay them to show new Neat Hobby! content to people who've already voluntarily opted in.
Fascinating account of the period following Nirvana's Nevermind during which record companies booted their flagship pop and hair metal acts to the curb in favor of noisy "bands with one-word titles, like Truckdriver."
Ah, those heady last days of the seven-album-deal-with-"recoupable"-advance.
Too much good stuff to quote:
Every major label sent platoons of A&R scouts all over the world, armed with yearly expense budgets of up to $100,000 to wine and dine every halfway-decent (or sometimes not-decent-at-all) band in flannel shirts making dissonant guitar noise. Helmet, an unknown band that had Nirvana's bludgeoning power but none of its radio-friendly melodies, signed to Interscope Records for a reported $1 million. Dave Katznelson, a Warner Bros. Records A&R vice president, paid In the Red Records' Larry Hardy $5,000 per band to simply alert him to new discoveries, such as the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. Virgin Records spent more than $1 million on Royal Trux, not realizing there were only two people in the band; Jennifer Herrema and Neil Hagerty had to scramble to find musicians to back them so they could play a showcase at Los Angeles' Viper Room, on the Sunset Strip, for the many label scouts involved in that bidding war.
Content warning, for details on the death of Mia Zapata. But also: a twist ending worth getting to.
I wasn't sure how well Jeff VanderMeer's surreal cli-fi story was going to translate to the big screen, but it's been adapted by Alex Garland, who wrote Ex Machina and Sunshine -- surreal is kind of his thing.