The Tremendous 10 link roundup, #56

1. Why is so much of design school a waste of time? “Q: My teacher hates everything I make, even though I spend all this time working on it, and gets mad even when I follow his advice. Sometimes designers who are working come to talk to us, but they never get what I’m trying to do. There’s all this useless talking when they should just teach us things. Should I just quit school and go work somewhere? I feel like this is a waste of time.”
2. Misused mobile UX patterns | “If you are an experienced designer, you probably agree that being inspired by others is not stealing in UI design. It’s best practice research. It’s using design patterns. It’s following the guidelines. It’s making sure to use patterns that your users are familiar with to create usable interfaces. Some might say that sticking to the guidelines and following others will kill creativity and, at the end of the day, all apps will look the same. From a UX perspective I see a different problem.”
3. What Art Can Teach Business About Being Fussy | “It’s easy to get irritated by people who are very concerned about details. They are bothered by a comma, in the wrong place (that was on purpose); they get upset if the dishwasher is stacked in a suboptimal way; it takes them a month to select a colour to repaint the bedroom; they know the price of a paper clip or count the number of emails they send in a week. We’ve got some pretty negative names for their attitude: they are pernickety, obsessive, perfectionist, pedantic. They lack a sense of proportion; behind their backs we mock them for their absurd devotion. But in literature and the arts, there’s a different view of fussiness; here it seems like a prestigious virtue.”
4. Shut up about the y-axis. It shouldn’t always start at zero. | “If you write things on the internet, angry email is inevitable. If you make charts on the internet, angry email about those charts is inevitable. Especially if your charts sometimes use a y-axis that starts at a number other than zero. You see, an old book called How to Lie With Statistics has convinced people that truncated axes are a devilish tool of deception. The truth is that you certainly can use truncated axes to deceive. But you can also use them to illuminate.”
5. Amazon Storywriter | “Amazon Storywriter automatically formats your screenplay as you type, so you can focus on the story and skip the busywork… Maximize your productivity by using our installable app when you are off the grid…Amazon Storywriter syncs your work and displays your screenplays beautifully on any device.”
6. Stanford’s most popular class isn’t computer science—it’s something much more important | “It’s called “Designing Your Life,” a course that’s part throwback, part foreshadowing of higher education’s future.”
7. Teenager Wins $400,000 For His Video Explaining Einstein’s Theory of Relativity | “Still baffled by Einstein’s theory of relativity, or even the parts in the movie Interstellar when everyone experiences time differently? Well, this teenager’s explanation of special relativity even gives Carl Sagan a run for his money. Ryan Chester, from North Royalton in Ohio, submitted his video for the Breakthrough Junior Challenge, which invites students aged 13-18 to share their passion for math and science with the world. The competition received over 2,000 applications from 86 countries.”
8. Google steps up to defend fair use, will fund Youtubers’ legal defenses | “After years of missteps, blunders and disasters in which Youtube users have been censored through spurious copyright claims or had their accounts deleted altogether, Google has announced an amazing, user-friendly new initiative though which it will fund the legal defense of Youtube creators who are censored by bad-faith copyright infringement claims.”
9. 10 Maps That Will Change How You View The World | “Maps are one of those things you can lose yourself in for hours. Since their humble origins as scribbles in the sand thousands of millennia ago, maps have been useful companions during the development of human culture and society. Now, in an age of seemingly endless information, maps are more abundant, advanced and fascinating than ever before. Here are some of the most interesting maps we could find; hopefully, they will leave you looking at our little “pale blue dot” with a fresh perspective.”
10. 10 Reasons You Should Watch The BMX Movie Rad (Again) | “Like you needed any.”

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash.