Apple ditches cars, forget learning code, lonesome designers

Howdy! Welcome to this week’s Whiteboard Roundup.

I’ve been getting back into the myriad of evening events in Norwich this week, including the fab Norfolk Network where we heard from Georgie Delaney of The Great Outdoor Gym Company, all about her company’s journey and how she sees the future of fitness.

Plus, I went to see Mike Wozniak perform his latest show, Zusa, at Diss Corn Hall - beautiful venue I’d not been to before. If you haven’t seen his show, make sure you do. It’s hilarious and uplifting and he’s a fabulous storyteller.

All in all, not a bad week. Despite the weather.

Cheers.

Tom HaczewskiDirector, The User Story

News

The Apple Car is no more

Apple have decided to go all-in on AI, and has ditched their self-driving car prototype after a decade of development.

Sometimes you just gotta know when to quit. With other car manufacturers far further ahead, and with AI being a catch-all that could actually feed into self-driving car software - the bit that Apple might have some expertise in at least - it seems like the right decision.

So much so, that their share price leapt at the news.

Have a read.

Stop teaching kids to code

I totally agree with this, and have been saying it for a while - we need to stop teaching kids how to code, especially specific languages. But we should be teaching them about how software works, and how to use AI to get what they need.

AI is an incredible tool, and like all tools, it’s only as good as the person who wields it. AI can produce some very funky results but if you nurture your queries and engineer your prompts, you can create works of art or incredible systems.

For us to get ahead and give our next generations a chance to survive in a very rapidly changing technological landscape, we’ve gotta show them how to use this stuff.

See what you think.

Life as a solo designer in a startup

Designers in large companies rest on laurels they don’t even know are there. Being a solo designer comes with the need for flexibility, adaptability, and huge requests on your time, not to mention testing your collaboration and communication skills. It’s isolating too, with not many people to learn from or ways to gain inspiration and advice.

There’s a nice view of a solo designer’s first two years on the job with a growing startup here, as Lisa Demchenko takes us through how she’s learned and adapted to the role.

Give it a read.

What we’re up to.

🚑 The STD* Clinic14 March, 4pmWe’re back again for some new website teardowns - want to get your site looked at? Join us here and put your URL in the chat, and we’ll have a look.*Suboptimal Tech DesignSign up here

Check out our previous videosIf you missed my last videos, you can see them all here. Have a look, they’re fun!Replays

Thanks for reading.

You’re looking capable and fabulous.

As you’re here to the end, here’s my thought for the week to leave you on:

See you next time, friends!

Brought to you by Tom Haczewski, director of The User Story. We’re a product strategy, research and UX agency based in Norwich, working with SaaS teams and startups.