dotgo
04–08–25
designing online to go offline
my software design manifesto
The point of technology is user experience — and the biggest achievement is creating something that comes alive in the physical world.
Especially for software.
Whether it’s a note-taking app, social media platform, or one of the infinite SaaS ideas out there, a truly effective product will change the user’s real life.
A good product will make it better.
A good online budgeting service helps someone purchase something meaningful in the real world. A good social platform leads to real-world friendships. A good note-taking app helps users write songs, essays, poems — even books — that are shared, exchanged, and embedded into the rhythms of real human minds.
On the other hand, products that isolate users from their lives — short-form dopamine traps, meme coin casinos, exploitative gambling mechanics — these are malignant. They represent unethical design. They extract value from the user rather than giving - the antithesis of the true meaning of technology creation.
Once I fully realized my passion for design and human systems engineering, I wrote these values to ensure everything I design flows offline:
Especially for software.
Whether it’s a note-taking app, social media platform, or one of the infinite SaaS ideas out there, a truly effective product will change the user’s real life.
A good product will make it better.
A good online budgeting service helps someone purchase something meaningful in the real world. A good social platform leads to real-world friendships. A good note-taking app helps users write songs, essays, poems — even books — that are shared, exchanged, and embedded into the rhythms of real human minds.
On the other hand, products that isolate users from their lives — short-form dopamine traps, meme coin casinos, exploitative gambling mechanics — these are malignant. They represent unethical design. They extract value from the user rather than giving - the antithesis of the true meaning of technology creation.
Once I fully realized my passion for design and human systems engineering, I wrote these values to ensure everything I design flows offline:
- I am meant to make things beautiful and give them back to the world.
- To master a craft is to let it become an extension of myself.
- Saving time is saving life.
- Observe patterns. Invent pathways.
- The deepest form of appreciation is understanding.
- Feedback is water - taste is a compass.
I want to design as a selfless act because products are a service.
But I also require projects I work on to be things I myself would use.
This is how design both remains a service and becomes an art.
I can combine the intimate selfishness of creating something for myself (art) with the power of user-experience design (service)
I believe this is how we get good products, not just effective ones: beautiful and useful pieces of software with positive effects that manifest in the real world.
Thanks for reading :]