Your Sparkles Are Fizzling

<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" /> <title>Your Sparkles Are Fizzling | Big Medium</title> <meta name="description" content="Let’s retire the sparkle emoji, purple hues, and rainbow gradients for AI-powered features." /> <meta name="author" content="Josh Clark" /> <meta name="copyright" content="Copyright Big Medium, 2024" /> <link rel="canonical" href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/your-sparkles-are-fizzling.html" /> <meta name="robots" content="index,follow" /> <link rel="icon" href="https://bigmedium.com/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" /> <link rel="shortcut icon" href="https://bigmedium.com/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" /> <link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.feed.xml" title="Big Medium - Full Feed" /> <link rel="stylesheet" href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.styles.css" type="text/css" /> <style 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href="/bm.tags/sentient-design/">a series about Sentient Design</a>, the already-here future of intelligent interfaces and AI-mediated experiences.</p> <h3 class="u--zero-bottom-margin">The book</h3> <p><cite>Sentient Design</cite> by Josh Clark with Veronika Kindred will be published by <a href="https://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/sentient-design/">Rosenfeld Media</a>.</p> <h3 class="u--zero-bottom-margin">The talk</h3> <p class="u--zero-bottom-margin"><a href="/speaking/sentient-design-josh-clark-talk.html"><img src="/bm.pix/josh-clark-casual-intelligence.4x3-500.jpg" width="600" height="375" alt="Photo of Josh Clark speaking in front of a screen that says, "Get cozy with casual intelligence"" style="width:100%; max-width:324px;" /></a></p> <p class="bm-caption"><a href="/speaking/sentient-design-josh-clark-talk.html">Watch Josh Clark's talk “Sentient Design”</a></p> <h3 class="u--zero-bottom-margin">The workshop</h3> <p><p>Book a <a href="/ideas/workshop-sentient-design-ai-experiences.html">workshop for designing AI-powered experiences</a>.</p> <h3 class="u--zero-bottom-margin">Need help?</h3> <p>If you’re working on strategy, design, or development of AI-powered products, we do that! <a href="/hire/">Get in touch.</a></p> </aside> <p>Please put the ✨sparkles✨ away. They’re sprinkled everywhere these days, drizzled on every AI tool, along with a heaping dollop of purple hues and rainbow gradients. <em>It’s magic, it’s special, it’s sparkly.</em> </p> <p>It’s really <em>not</em> magic, of course—it’s just software. And because so many companies have heedlessly bolted AI features onto existing products, the shipped features are often half-baked, experimental, frequently shoddy. Instead of “magic” or “new,” sparkles are fast becoming the new badge for “beta.” The message sparkles now convey is, “This feature is weird and probably broken—good luck!” It would be more honest to use this emoji instead: 🤪</p> <p>So what symbol should you use to represent machine-intelligent tools? <em>How about no symbol at all.</em> No need to segregate AI features or advertise their AI-ness as anything special. What matters to the user is what it does, not how it’s implemented.</p> <figure class="media-left bmc_image"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sparkle-buttons.png" rel="bm_lightbox" title="" target="_blank"><img src="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sparkle-buttons.orig-250.png" alt="Image of buttons before and after having their sparkles removed. The buttons are labeled "Create," "Summarize," and "Revise."" srcset="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sparkle-buttons.orig-2000.png 1012w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sparkle-buttons.orig-1000.png 1000w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sparkle-buttons.orig-500.png 500w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sparkle-buttons.orig-250.png 250w" sizes="(min-width: 640px) 720px, 100vw" title="Click to enlarge" /></a> </figure> <p>We give no special billing to spell checkers or spam filters or other algorithmic tools; we just expect them to work. That’s the expectation we should set for <em>all</em> features, whether they’re enabled by machine intelligence or not. Features should just do what it says on the tin, without the sparkle-shaped asterisk. You’re revising text, generating images, assembling insights, making music, recommending content, predicting next steps, etc. These are simply product features—like every other powerful feature your experience offers—so present them that way. No special label required, no jazz hands needed.</p> <blockquote class="pullquote media-center"> Drop the sparkles. No need to segregate AI features or advertise their AI-ness as anything special. What matters to the user is what it does, not how it’s implemented. </blockquote> <p>One of the essential characteristics of <a href="http://bigmedium.com/ideas/hello-sentient-design.html">Sentient Design</a> is that it is deferential. It’s a posture that suggests humility. Put the disco ball away. Your goal should be to make machine intelligence a helpful and seamless part of the user experience, not a novelty or an afterthought.</p> <p>If the feature actually <em>is</em> weird, unreliable, or broken, that’s a bigger problem that sparkles won’t solve. Maybe your feature isn’t ready to ship. Or better, perhaps you need to find a way to make the weirdness an asset instead of a reliability. Now <em>that’s</em> a fun design challenge to solve—and one that engages with the grain of machine intelligence as a design material. Take a measured pragmatic approach to what machine intelligence is good at and what it isn’t—and be equally measured in how you label it. Be cool. Put away the sparkles.</p> <hr /> <p><em>Is your organization trying to understand the role of AI in your mission and practice? We can help! Big Medium does design, development, and product strategy for AI-mediated experiences; we facilitate Sentient Design sprints; <a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/workshop-sentient-design-ai-experiences.html">we teach AI workshops</a>; and we offer executive briefings. <a href="https://bigmedium.com/hire/">Get in touch to learn more.</a></em></p> </div>   </section> <section class="moreinfo">  <h3>Read more about...</h3> <ul class="bmw_tags"> <li><a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/icons/" rel="tag">icons</a></li> <li><a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/ai/" rel="tag">ai</a></li> <li><a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/design/" rel="tag">design</a></li> <li><a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/sentient-design/">sentient design</a></li> <li><a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/web-design/">web design</a></li> </ul>  </section> </div> </article> </main> <section class="touts"> <div class="lc u--zero-pad"> <div class="standard-margin touts-3up"> <h2><a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/" class="kicker kicker--invert">Ideas</a></h2>  <div class="tout-links tout-links--latest tout-links--sec-ideas"> <div class="bmw_link bma_page1685"> <div class="bma_mediatop"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/workshop-sentient-design-ai-experiences.html" class="bma_thumb"><img src="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sentent-design-workshop.4x3-250.png" class="bma_thumb" alt="Four devices lighting up with Sentient Design and machine intelligence" srcset="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sentent-design-workshop.4x3-2000.png 1200w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sentent-design-workshop.4x3-1000.png 1000w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sentent-design-workshop.4x3-500.png 500w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/sentent-design-workshop.4x3-250.png 250w" sizes="(min-width: 1050px) 449px, 50vw" /></a> </div> <div class="bma_body"> <div class="bma_body-wrap"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/events-workshops/" class="kicker kicker--tout kicker--invert">events & workshops</a> <h3 class="bma_head"><a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/workshop-sentient-design-ai-experiences.html" title="Workshop: Craft AI-Powered Experiences with Sentient Design" rel="bookmark">Workshop: Craft AI-Powered Experiences with Sentient Design</a></h3> <div class="bma_desc">Reserve a private workshop to teach your product and design teams to imagine, design, and deliver AI-powered features and products.</div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="bmw_link bma_page1698"> <div class="bma_mediatop"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/design-system-governance-bugs-design-discrepancies.html" class="bma_thumb"><img src="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/governance.4x3-250.png" class="bma_thumb" alt="Point" srcset="https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/governance.4x3-2000.png 1066w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/governance.4x3-1000.png 1000w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/governance.4x3-500.png 500w, https://bigmedium.com/bm.pix/governance.4x3-250.png 250w" sizes="(min-width: 1050px) 449px, 50vw" /></a> </div> <div class="bma_body"> <div class="bma_body-wrap"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/bm.tags/design-system/" class="kicker kicker--tout kicker--invert">design system</a> <h3 class="bma_head"><a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/design-system-governance-bugs-design-discrepancies.html" title="“The Design System Isn't Working for Me!”" rel="bookmark">“The Design System Isn't Working for Me!”</a></h3> <div class="bma_desc">What’s going on when a design system’s can’t get it to do what they need? 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Look out, enterprise, here comes Sentient Design.</div> </div> </div> </div> </div>  <div class="continue"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/links/" class="btn btn--next"> <span class="btn-arrow-text--right">More Links</span> </a> </div> </div> </div> </section> <section id="nav" class="prefooter"> <div class="toolbar"> <div class="lc"> <a href="https://bigmedium.com/" class="logo"> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 830 147" role="img" aria-label="Big Medium" preserveAspectRatio="xMaxYMax meet"><title>Big Medium</title><desc>Big Medium logo</desc><use xlink:href="#bmlogo" id="footerLogo" /></svg> </a> <a href="#bm-top" id="BackToTop" class="icon icon-menu-up icon-utility">Back to top</a> </div> </div> <div class="lc">  <form action="https://bigmedium.com/cgi-bin/moxiebin/bm-search.cgi/q/3" method="get" class="bmw_search" enctype="multipart/form-data" accept-charset="utf-8"><div> <input type="search" name="bmq" placeholder="Search" value="" /> <button type="submit" class="icon icon-search icon-utility">Search</button> <input type="hidden" name="bms" value="3" /> </div></form>  <nav class="bmw_navigation bmn_hnav" role="navigation"> <div class="bmn_skipnav"><a href="#bm-skipnavbottom">Skip Navigation</a></div> <ul> <li class="bmn_sec-ideas bmn_active"><a title="" href="https://bigmedium.com/ideas/">Ideas</a></li> <li class="bmn_sec-projects"><a title="" href="https://bigmedium.com/projects/">Projects</a></li> <li class="bmn_sec-speaking"><a title="" href="https://bigmedium.com/speaking/">Talks</a></li> <li class="bmn_sec-about"><a title="" href="https://bigmedium.com/about/">About</a></li> <li class="bmn_sec-hire"><a title="" href="https://bigmedium.com/hire/">Hire Us</a></li> </ul> <span class="bmn_clearNav" id="bm-skipnavbottom"> </span> </nav> </div> </section>  <div class="bmw_footer"> <footer class="footer"> <div class="lc"> <div class="read-us"> <h3>Read us</h3> <ul> <li class="book-atomic"> <a href="https://atomicdesign.bradfrost.com"> <img src="/pix/atomic-design.png" alt="Atomic Design, by Brad Frost" /> </a> </li> <li class="book-touch"> <a href="http://abookapart.com/products/designing-for-touch"> <img src="/pix/designing-for-touch.png" alt="Designing for Touch, by Josh Clark" /> </a> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="hire-us"> <h3>Work with us</h3> <ul> <li><a href="/hire/#design-systems">Design systems</a></li> <li><a href="/hire/#ui-ux-design">Interface and experience design</a></li> <li><a href="/hire/#product-strategy-process">Digital strategy and process</a></li> <li><a href="/hire/#production">Production and co-creation</a></li> <li><a href="/hire/#action-plan">Action plan</a></li> <li><a href="/hire/#coaching">Coaching and hands-on advice</a></li> <li><a href="/hire/#workshops-talks">Workshops and talks</a></li> </ul> </div> <div class="follow-us"> <h3>Follow us</h3> <h4>Get the <a href="/ideas/big-medium-newsletter.html">newsletter</a></h4> <div id="mc_embed_shell_bmfooter" class="bmc_mailchimp"> <div id="mc_embed_signup_bmfooter"> <form action="https://bigmedium.us5.list-manage.com/subscribe/post?u=6c0c3f4dcd40d88bc1cedb3fa&id=7540015453&f_id=00d6c4eaf0" method="post" id="mc-embedded-subscribe-form_bmfooter" name="mc-embedded-subscribe-form" class="validate" target="_self" novalidate=""> <div id="mc_embed_signup_scroll_bmfooter"> <div class="mc-field-group"><label for="mce-EMAIL_bmfooter">Email Address</label><input type="email" name="EMAIL" class="required email" id="mce-EMAIL_bmfooter" required="" value=""></div> <div id="mce-responses_bmfooter" class="clear"> <div class="response" id="mce-error-response_bmfooter" style="display: none;"></div> <div class="response" id="mce-success-response_bmfooter" style="display: none;"></div> </div><div class="clear"><input type="submit" class="btn" name="subscribe" id="mc-embedded-subscribe_bmfooter" class="button" value="Subscribe"></div> </div> </form> </div> </div> <ul class="social"> <li><a href="https://twitter.com/bigmediumjosh" class="icon icon-twitter">Twitter</a></li> <li><a href="/bm.feed.xml" class="icon icon-rss">RSS</a></li> <li><a href="https://instagram.com/joshclark/" class="icon icon-instagram">Instagram</a></li> <li><a href="https://github.com/bigmedium" class="icon icon-github">Github</a></li> </ul> </div> <div class="contact-us"> <h3>Contact us</h3> <div itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Organization"> <div> <h4>Start with Josh Clark</h4> <meta itemprop="name" content="Big Medium" /> <meta itemprop="sameAs" content="https://bigmedium.com/" /> </div> <p > <a itemprop="email" href="mailto:josh@bigmedium.com">josh@bigmedium.com</a><br /> <a itemprop="telephone" href="tel:+14013393381" class="p-tel">(401) 339-3381</a> </p> </div> </div> <p class="copyright"> Big Medium is a Global Moxie company.<br /> Copyright 2003–2024 Global Moxie, LLC. 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