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Besides the odd cash-in-hand jobs I did in my teens and early twenties, I was only ever an employee of two companies – for the total length of around two years. For most of my life, I’ve opted for the often joyous, frequently torturous rollercoaster ride that is self-employment.
There are many reasons for choosing an independent career path. We often talk about freedom in the sense that it allows us to set our own schedules (as I did a few weeks ago) but the type of freedom I enjoy most of all is not having to leave my conscience at home when I go to work. In other words: I’m extremely lucky to not have to put up a layer of ‘professionalism’ to make a living.
Not everyone has that choice, unfortunately. But I believe the idea of ‘ethics alignment’ doesn’t get enough consideration when people in tech look for a new job. I don’t think you have to work for yourself to be able to take your conscience to work, but companies that aren’t willing to compromise on their values in order to grow are few and far between.
– Kai
Dense Discovery is currently read by over 43,000 subscribers. Support us by (1) Sponsoring an issue, (2) Booking a classified ad, or (3) Sharing this issue with friends and colleagues.
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SuperHi for Teams
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Learning is better together. Grow and refresh your team’s Code + Design skills on our flexible, practical online courses. Whether you’re a team of 2 or 200, we can create a custom plan that fits your needs. Teams from small agencies to large multinational companies have joined us to enhance their confidence and learn alongside our community from 65+ countries. We’ll support your team to learn the SuperHi way!
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Apps & Sites
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The mininmal Itsycal will display your events as a companion to the Mac Calendar app. You can also create and delete (but not edit) events.
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Every cognitive bias in your pocket
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Become more aware of the many biases that inform your actions (or inactions) with Pocket Biases, a little app (also fully functions on the web) to explore what drives your behaviour.
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Artboard Studio is a web app that lets you apply your brand/designs to a growing gallery of product mock-ups, such as books, screens, t-shirts, and many other items.
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Towards more diverse and inclusive companies
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Recruitment app Homerun just published their own take on how to build more diverse and inclusive companies. It’s far from a complete guide (if such a thing exists) but certainly a great introduction to help leaders/managers get started.
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Idle Knowledge
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#History
Today, the # symbol is most commonly known as the number sign, hash, or pound sign, but it has a rich usage history with its origins tracing back to the symbol ℔, an abbreviation of the Roman term ‘libra pondo’, which translates as ‘pound weight’. The symbol was eventually reduced for clarity as an overlay of two horizontal strokes ‘=’ across two slash-like strokes ‘//’. Over time, the symbol gained many other names (and uses) in English: octothorp, sharp, space, gate, crosshatch, (garden) fence, mesh, flash, grid, pig-pen, tictactoe, scratch (mark), (garden) gate, hak, oof, rake, crunch, punch mark, sink, corridor, capital 3, and waffle.
(Source)
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Goods & Accessories
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Compact gear carrier
The DUO Daypack comes with enough compartments, pockets, and gear expansion pads to carry all your gadgets securely in one bag. Its smart InfiniteZip system gives you quick, on-the-go access to all of your gear. The material used copes with pretty much any weather extreme you throw at it.
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Recycled plastic iPhone cover
The Nimble Bottle Case doesn’t use virgin plastics – it’s made from 100% recycled plastic bottles. In addition, 5% of the price of the case goes toward protecting oceans and marine life. Nimble works with five water-related organisations: when you choose a case colour, you also choose which organisation to support.
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Overheard on Twitter
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CNN & Fox News has done to our parents what they thought violent video games & Marilyn Manson would do to us.
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Food For Thought
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Maciej Cegłowski’s writing never disappoints: “I’ll call it ‘ambient privacy’ – the understanding that there is value in having our everyday interactions with one another remain outside the reach of monitoring, and that the small details of our daily lives should pass by unremembered. What we do at home, work, church, school, or in our leisure time does not belong in a permanent record. Not every conversation needs to be a deposition.”
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Mark your calendars: Friday, September 20th will be a day of global general strikes for climate justice. I encourage you/your business to participate and take a stand! “What all of these people have in common is a strong sense that business as usual has become the problem, and that it needs to be interrupted, if only for a day. The climate crisis is a perplexing one because, mostly, we just get up each day and do what we did the day before, as if an enormous emergency weren’t unfolding around us.” (Possible paywall)
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Ever wondered where those obnoxious ‘promoted content’ blocks underneath reputable journalistic sources come from? “I want to take a journey with you beyond the titillating images. I want to walk together through the ad-tech underbelly of this entire weird commercial infrastructure. Who are the people and companies that subject us to this? Who makes money and how?”
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Aesthetically Pleasing
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Gustella was conceived to catch and endear the graphic designer’s eye. “Placing Gustella in the not-so-distant past, it might be related to the extreme slab serifs. The ones we see in Hollywood ‘Western’ movies, mostly used to compose the word ‘WANTED’.”
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Aakash Nihalani creates illusionist art that pushes the boundaries between two and three dimensions.
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Classifieds
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Design Tomorrow is a podcast about the making of the future. Each episode is a rich sonic experience that will entertain, inspire, and challenge you to create a better tomorrow.
Emailancer are your fast and friendly experts in email template design and development. We can deliver a custom design or convert yours into code that works across all devices.
Print matters. Browse and buy 100s of independent magazines at Pics & Ink. Free UK shipping (discount for overseas) by using DENSE2019 on first order. Have a browse.
PingPong handles the painful parts of design research: recruit, schedule, record, transcribe and pay testers. Perfect for user interviews, user tests and design sprints. Try PingPong.
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Book yours →
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The Week in a GIF
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Email us the URL to your favourite GIF and we might feature it here in a future issue.
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