kasey klimes

if you thought "taste" was an odd fit for silicon valley's obsession, wait until they discover that what they really want is "theory of mind"

the upcoming betaworks camp theme is the most exciting one yet—agent systems

I’m grateful to be a part of the betaworks community. there is no greater center of gravity for oddball creative founders thinking at frontier of possibility

many of today’s problems with coding agents were foreseen decades ago

relistening to user study sessions > podcasts about startups

the rumors are true, hmu

holy fuck

I’d be very curious what the post:reply ratio is here vs twitter

Saying LLMs are worthless/pernicious because they sometimes make mistakes & is causing a general decline in reading skills (true) is like saying Google Maps is worthless/pernicous just because it sometimes gives you bad directions & has caused a general decline in human navigation skills (also true)

startups!
how has AI code-gen changed your team’s approach to collaboration? how have you adapted your team workflows? what are the second order effects?

must be something like that

woah, bunch of new followers here all of a sudden, did I miss something?

hi 👋

hey laurel! st louisan (and fellow design educator) here, sounds like you’re in nyc, happy to grab a coffee and give you the inside scoop if you have time before you bounce. congrats on the gig!

!

ngl building a company is the hardest thing I’ve ever done

I believe strongly in permissionless innovation and also that I specifically should not be allowed to code

possibly, I’ve never heard that!

kinda messed up that steve jobs is known for the "bicycle for the mind" metaphor when it was bill atkinson who built hypercard and steve jobs who killed it

I am building end-user programming for AI agents because limiting what gets built to the tiny group of people with technical knowledge limits us as a species.

I love the way this book vaguely feels like it was written for grade school students at the same time that it’s a universal reference point for the most intelligent people I know

the week in pictures

(new york, I love you)

bsky wednesday?

6. do not present your solution as blocks. most do not look at a pile of bricks and see a home. most do not want blocks. instead, present the fully composed solution —then let its adaptability become clear through use. design for emergence is not a paradigm people come for, it’s one they stay for.

5. build your own solution to each problem from your new blocks. pay close attention to where it feels strange. if you feel the urge to cludge new features on to your blocks, you may have the wrong blocks. think about how to address the need with better block design, not patches.

4. decompose each solution into recursive building blocks until the same building blocks can be conjoined to solve all fundamental problems. size matters. too big a block and you won’t have good fit with the problem, too small and it will no longer be ergonomic in the hand.

3. discern the corresponding shape of a solution to each core problem. what is the platonic ideal of an end user experience for each? map every force tugging on the experience—note where two push against the same spot. fold each pair into one design question and shape until both sit calmly together.

2. soften your gaze, trace the shapes of fundamental problems, abstract them from your experience. what is the thing, really? ignore the tools and tech, they will smuggle artificial lenses into your process.

how to design for emergence

1. become intimately, brutally familiar with the real world problem space—develop an in situ fingerfeel for it, dunk your whole body in it

A story about why Democrats are losers, in four parts.

YouTube video by Dynamicland Computational Public Space

babe wake up, bret victor dropped a video on public space (?!)

youtu.be/PixPSNRDNMU?...

thanks Brian! that was intentional though — our interview was for a different tool I’m building :)