EP 44: Adobe BearTrap 2000

"Serious" episode with more AI ruminations in which we decide we're going to make a YMCA for designers.

went “paste-up” / hand-done for this week, because we are tired of Adobe

Creative Cloud: we’ll make you pay for it, and we’ll also maybe sometimes use your stuff to train our AI with. Tee hee!

Another day, another painful twist of the arm of the monopoly that is design software: this week we discuss the recent Adobe PR-splosion over their ambiguous terms and conditions. According to Justin’s research (shout out to Plagiarism Today for the play-by-play), these terms and conditions weren’t changed with the introduction of AI in Adobe software, but they sound like they’d allow Adobe the opportunity to swipe Adobe subscribers’s work if Adobe desired as such.

apparently it has been this way, for a while

Also *BREAKING* as we write this newsletter, both Techcrunch and The Verge published this article on how the US government is suing Adobe for making subscription cancellations wildly difficult (which Helen blabs about for a solid 2 minutes about bizarre cancellation fees that vary in amount depending on the month one decides to cancel).

And yes, while we are aware of some software alternatives out there, how do we solve for when we’re working within a larger team that uses Adobe products, or a client whose design needs can’t solely live within Figma? “Open source”-ness or interoperability has been obliterated by the monopoly. Fellow peeps, if you have had personal experience with Adobe alternatives, we’d love to hear your experiences.

have YOU tried any of these? and if so how many stars out of 5

The other subject we think on is a bit of the identity crisis that designers today encounter (shoutout to Ruben Pater’s CAPS LOCK): as technology continues to accelerate towards automation and self-generation, where within “The Matrix” of it all do we plug into? We contemplate our helplessness (and the general bull-shit-ness of “AI” as a “technology”—shoutout On the Media for this in-depth takedown) as we wave goodbye to relevance as we board the train to Aging Millennials, population of 2.

via a 40 Trillion DPI fave, @northwest_mcm_wholesale

word slop and weird sexy lady slop: aka soylent for your eyes

We needed a naïve positive cheer-up, so we found this fun publication from the 90s: MONDO 2000!

In an effort to lift our wilted spirits, we sate our eyeballs with Mondo 2000, a world wide web-positive magazine for cyberspace fans. The design of the publication is decidedly refreshing, as in you can feel the excitement the designer was feeling when they were getting wild in QuarkXPress.

back in a time of utopian internet idealism

We essentially gaggle and marvel over some of the wild content. Some screenshots below of what catches our eye! Also, there’s a nice ‘n’ neat article from Document Journal where Claire Evans interviews R.U. Sirius, one of MONDO 2000’s founders.

absolutely no notes from us. just great

the TV is also part of the polycule, obviously

cute

Oh, for the time when the internet was about connectivity and communication, as opposed to talking heads, rampant shitposting, and the ugly reality of misogyny in society. We hypothesize that designers need their own version of a YMCA—a multigenerational space that facilitates knowledge-sharing and cross-conversation.

Alright, that’s the download from us; see you in a bit! If you’re in the Bay Area we’ll be at the SF Art Book Fair in July! Ciao ciao!