The Observatory Newsletter

Ellen McGirt

Systems are failing. Just ask airport staff.

When a major tech platform goes down for any reason, a meme typically circulates as the online masses gleefully imagine the panic of the incompetents as they rush to find the problem.

Ellen McGirt

If you have good taste and excellent discernment, this is your time to shine.

Last month OpenAI president Greg Brockman wrote on X that "Taste is a new core skill." Sam Altman, posting before both OpenAI’s latest $110 billion funding round and controversial Pentagon contract, agreed. "We believe the best …

Ellen McGirt

Every problem is a design problem. This one is public safety.

The role voters must play in regulating the government's use of AI

Ellen McGirt

Designing for racial inclusion

Ellen McGirt

A devotion to the human face

Ellen McGirt

Branding the global water crisis

Ellen McGirt

Innovators, don't be afraid of the dark

True innovation requires imagination and courage.

Rachel Paese

AI actors are here, but what moves us hasn't vanished

As synthetic humans enter our feeds and screens, the desire for deeply human culture hasn’t disappeared.

Ellen McGirt|New Ideas

Gen-AI is a threat to human thinking

Generative AI doesn’t just change how we design, it may also change how we think.

Ellen McGirt

Lessons in connoisseurship from the Golden Globes

Connoisseurship requires context, which requires time, commitment, and patience.

Ellen McGirt|Holiday Gift Guide

Visions of sugar-plums

A year-end reflection on design’s evolving role—plus a thoughtful holiday gift guide featuring books to inspire curiosity, craft, and creative leadership.

Ellen McGirt

Dispatches from Design Week in Hong Kong

A necessary reminder of the role that design, and designers, must play in building a better world.