In 50 Shades of #FAFAFA Jon Moore takes a moderately inappropriate look at silly things designers do and don’t do.
1. Use a UI framework. 2. Stop creating your own typography rules. 3. Pick 5 colors (check out #2 at that link). 4. Make your grays darker. 5. Symmetry really isn’t that important. 6. Find all the thin/lightweight fonts in your design and bump them up one weight. 7. Your design isn’t an art piece. 8. Monitors are getting huge, but you don’t need to use all that space. 9. Also, whitespace can’t be “wasted.” 10. Oh and also, (ALSO!), the “fold” isn’t a thing that exists in apps. 11. Stop giving your charts shadows. 12. Dribbble “likes” don’t pay the bills. 13. Innovate on the whiteboard, not in [your design app]. 14. Use a f_cking icon set! 15. Nobody loves your design more than you do. 16. Your design should be rooted in value, not art. 17. Worry about component-level details during development sprints. 18. Every misplaced pixel is like a typo in a novel. 19. You know that one screen that has a button label misaligned? 20. Name your layers. 21. Use a grid. 22. You know how dev will “get” what you mean? 23. Mila Kunis doesn’t use your marketing app. 24. Don’t try to make your next UI “Brutalist.” 25. Maybe your PM doesn’t “get” your genius. Or maybe you’re not a genius and you should take their advice. 26. Cut down your time spent animating your UI design by not animating your UI design. 27-a . If you can’t think of a reason why you did something when you’re presenting, make something up. 28. Lobster is the new Comic Sans. 29. If Proxima Nova was a constellation, it would be the Big Dipper. Everyone can see it but nobody really cares. 30. Stop talking about your rejected designs. 31. Setup hot keys. 32. Teach developers to fish. 33. You know that horrible panicky feeling you get when you realize your design might not be great? 34. No but seriously. That sinking feeling that you overlooked something big? 35. Don’t fall back on defending your design with data. 36. Speaking of which, remember hamburger menus? 37. If you wrote more than one paragraph explaining a single screen, then you should probably handle this in person. 38. Thinking about trying a cool gradient? Watch out! 39. Are you a “full stack designer?” 40. Let’s leave coding to the experts.