Brian Thomas Clark

I'm not alone in this experience. I recall discussing with Chris Black of How Long Gone how influential these magazine-driven Borders explorations were for him. It was akin to traveling without the expense of a Virgin Atlantic ticket, building a repository of references by turning pages and tapping into cultural hubs. It involved dedicating time... See more

As anything scales too effectively - from fashion to restaurants to music - the market opens for more non-scalable alternatives. Once Starbucks opens on every block, many of us crave the artisanal coffee shop. Once our favorite Italian restaurant becomes a chain of three, we grow tired of it. Why? First, so much of what we buy and do is tied up in... See more

I can’t stop thinking about how objects hold me. How they alter the way I carry myself in a new room. Or hug me when surrounded by strangers. Clothes keep teaching me valuable lessons of tenderness and repair–of repetition, and the importance of returning to things that are worthy of love. This is not to encourage anxiety or hyper-attachment to our... See more

Component-based design systems produce inherent efficiencies for designers and developers, and solve the challenges associated with duplication and inconsistency in applying themes -- while driving the development of better quality, reusable components. Clients gain the benefit of better brand management resulting from a simplified content editor... See more

If you’re trying to lead real change, the most important question is not “How do we drive adoption?” It is “How will this system try to stay itself?” Where will it perform agreement while preserving the old rules? Where will it translate the change into something harmless? What will it protect, and who will it protect?

Progress is not when people... See more

Everyone’s posting about 2016, with a heavy dose of nostalgia.

In 2016, Instagram switched their default feed from purely reverse chronological feed to algorithmically-sorted. In retrospect, this marks the beginning of a shift towards a passive, spoon-fed internet.

Product design matters — people are hungry for digital tools that actually allow them... See more

The stasis debate is actually just about two specific topics: (1) whether 21st century culture offers the feeling of artistic progress, where new styles/practices devalue previous ones, thereby creating clear chapters in the historical timeline, and (2) whether there are new techniques in symbolic activity that expand how we perceive the world and... See more

But that eternal present is a lie, an illusion, a fabrication of the digital interfaces. And this not only destroys our sense of the past but also undermines our ability to think about the future.

In an environment without past or future, all we have is stasis.

So it’s no coincidence that culture has stagnated in this eternal digital now . The same... See more

In his retrospective of 2023 for his company Acquia, a SaaS platform built on top of the open source (and browser-based) Drupal software, Buytaert noted both the dangers and opportunities for the web going forward. “On one side, the rise of AI in information gathering will decrease the need for traditional websites,” he wrote. “On the other side,... See more