UI/UX Articles and Interesting Tidbits of the Week
September//30//2022
Here are some interesting finds on UI/UX of the week!
1.
Figma and Adobe. Very interesting article from Casey Newton for The Verge on a very high profile event that has recently occurred as Adobe has made its intention of purchasing competitor Figma. The article is a brief conversation with Figma CEO Dylan Field, on what lies ahead for the product and what its role is going to be within the larger Adobe ecosystem. Well worth the read. Highlight of the article includes:
“The company’s user base grew accordingly, and by this year Figma was out-competing design giant Adobe among design teams at Microsoft and other companies. And so it was not particularly surprising when Adobe said this month that it intends to acquire Figma, keeping it as an autonomous unit within the company, with Field remaining as CEO. What was more surprising, perhaps, was the $20 billion Adobe offered: 40 times Figma’s current annual revenue run rate, and one of the largest startup acquisitions ever. Investors have been skeptical about the deal; Adobe’s stock price is down sharply since the acquisition was announced, whether due to sticker shock or fears that Lina Khan’s Federal Trade Commission will block the deal on the theory that it’s anticompetitive. (She has sued to block much smaller and arguably less consequential deals than this one.)”
2.
Moving away from CAPTCHA. Another interesting article from TechCrunch and author Kyle Wiggers on Cloudflare’s initiative in changing the dominance of Google’s Re-CAPTCHA service. As John Graham-Cumming indicates in the article, the time to improve the feature experience for this bot preventing mechanism is upon us, and Cloudflare has come up with Turnstile, which specifically aims to do so and better. Worth reading about this feature and what’s happening within this particular and omnipresent part of so many digital product experiences. Highlight of the article includes:
“The question is whether sites will be persuaded to deploy Turnstile over the incumbent CAPTCHA. By one measure, 97.7% of the top million websites by traffic use Google’s reCAPTCHA, currently the most popular CAPTCHA service on the market. Cloudflare says it’s working on plugins for major platforms like WordPress to make Turnstile easier to deploy, but it’ll likely take time to convince admins that it’s worth the effort — assuming they’re ever convinced. Graham-Cumming seemed mostly indifferent, noting that Cloudflare doesn’t have an obvious business incentive to drive adoption.”
3.
Linkedin Top Startups of 2022. Every year Linkedin showcases a listing of the top startups for the year, and 2022 has not been an exception. This article looks at who they are, how they’re faring from a growth and funding perspective, and what their focus is. From a Design centric perspective, it’s an opportunity for Designers to check what these entrepeneurial hubs of activity are delivering and even seek out networking opportunities. Well worth reading through. Highlight of the article includes:
“But while it’s a challenging moment, “some of the best, completely game-changing ideas come out of times of uncertainty,” writes Jennifer Hyman, who co-founded Rent the Runway during a similarly tough environment in 2009. Operating under constrained resources and limited capital may be beneficial for young companies, she argues, forcing them to prioritize assets and values, adapt quickly and be intentional in decision making.”
