[memexy]

Ya but you're probably taking certain things for granted that the author is not. The author thinks Figma really is amazing because it enables what they called "loop stacking" in the article. For programmers this is no big deal, programmers work with dynamic workflows and loops all the time. So if you're a programmer then I can see why you'd think it's overhyped but for most people it really is an amazing tool because it's an improvement over what they're used to.

I'm not a designer so I don't know how good it is and I only skimmed the article but the high level concepts in the article around managing design workflows make sense, e.g.

> Figma solved this problem. Designs in Figma are not just stored in the cloud; they are edited in the cloud, too. This means that Figma users are always working on the same design. With Dropbox, this isn’t true. The files may be stored in the cloud, but the editing happens locally—imagine the difference between sharing Word files in Dropbox vs. editing in Google Docs.

It sounds like Figma reduces friction in the collaboration process by clever use of cloud based and browser coordination. It's not innovative but it's a good application of existing technology to the design space.

[hypewatch]

Yeah I’m a programmer, so I think you could be right. I’d like to work with our designer using figma and get her thoughts / opinions to get a better understanding.

Also, because I’m a programmer, I’ve lived through many tech hype cycles (with mostly open source and developer tools). So over time I’ve become sensitive to this kind of rhetoric. That’s why my initial reaction was skepticism.

[cynusx]

> It sounds like Figma reduces friction in the collaboration process by clever use of cloud based and browser coordination. It's not innovative but it's a good application of existing technology to the design space.

Out of curiosity, what do you consider innovative?

[memexy]

Good question. Do you have a definition we can work with? I tend to focus on theoretical innovations like mathematical theories so my definition is often at odds with what most people think is innovative.

[cynusx]

Often innovation is in the eye of the beholder, for a clerk that's been manually entering data for years it might be innovative that it can be replaced with digitalization but for most researchers that's just "implementation" of existing tech.

I don't hold opinions on what the word should mean, just curious to find all the different meanings of it

[BoiledCabbage]

Innovation is also applying existing concepts in new scenarios.