This talk was given on October 12, 2017 at Mirror Conf in Braga, Portugal, and again on February 9, 2018 at the Awwwards Conference in Berlin.

A view on designing for the web

And, this is probably the most important bit: I work in Keynote. Each slide has an image or a short sentence describing the idea. Maybe I'll toss in a movie clip. In the presenter notes, I'm actually writing the full talk/essay. I like Keynote, because it's visual. I can nest slides inside one another like an outline; I can click and drag things around to change the order; I can display all the slides in a grid to get a sense of the pacing of the story. It's really quite wonderful—much closer to how my mind naturally works. I find it's essential for the "rich, media-heavy" stuff you're referencing.

You don't get to decide the truth

Another is a design studio for page and screen, led by Frank Chimero. We make lively work that threads digital and print for culture and commerce.

Two terrible years taught me the most important lesson about life I’ve ever learned on my own: you only become bulletproof when you refuse to disguise your injuries. This ends the show and deflates any notion that you have your shit together all the time. The wounds are a gift: with the mask gone, you get to be a person again. You learn how to accept help, and better yet, how to better give it.



Suddenly, all the stakes become much lower. Life is somehow more precious and less. You are a monkey in pants, after all. So what? There’s no need to be loud and stupid and desperate, because the desire that made you behave that way was so convoluted to start. What could those desires be for, and what would you ever do if they were fulfilled? You don’t know. But you shouldn’t feel bad for not knowing or for thinking such silly things. You’re just a monkey, kid, so cut yourself some slack.

The web runs on newness, but the massive quantity and disagreeable structure we place on that newness (*cough* streams) means it’s very easy to have your stance online become, as my friend Jason likes to say, “Fuck you, impress me.”

We are sold out of hardcover copies of the book. There are no current plans for a reprint. Apologies.