My buddy and I grew up in the 80's and 90's together in a mostly analog world, so we spent a bunch of time outside on bikes and getting dirty. We played board games a lot with each other and our family, but as the turn of the century hit we were more engrossed in technology.

We both ended up in careers around creative design and technology, but still have that nostalgia from our past. We have been hanging out this past year and started streaming on Twitch so we can put our skills to use in a fun hobby.

Since January we had the idea to see how far we could push AI to help us create a board game! It's been a fun time starting from nothing and producing something. While the AI craze and controversy are out there. We realized that going all AI to make a fun game wasn't going to work. We've been using it as a tool but adding a lot of ourselves to it.

We hope to give a free downloadable and 3d printable version out. We are excited to get where we are and have an actual fun game. We figured we'd share our progress of the game. Frostbite: The Curse of Doctor Frost

Does anybody know of communities that would be into downloading, printing, and playing board games?

I like a bit of M.C. Escher art, and I was looking for some Escher images when I stumbled across this old blog post by someone who designed and made his own Escher-inspired floor tiles. Fascinating stuff!

Here's the main page, showing a photo of the finished floor: https://danceswithferrets.org/geekblog/?page_id=911

Then there's 8 blog entries, showing the steps he went through from initial idea to finished product.

As a bonus, here's a simple guide I found, which explains how Escher designed & made his tiles: http://static1.squarespace.com/static/5754f47fcf80a16bffa02c45/t/57c6b680f7e0abc8f6ac6993/1472640669212/Escher-tiling-instructions.pdf

It's so simple when you know how! But there's obviously still some artistry involved in deciding what shapes to cut & paste.

As a railfan and a graphic designer, the first thing I check out when in a new town with public transit is their transit map. You can tell a lot about a city by how they represent themselves on a transit map, and I myself have designed more maps than I can count. What's the map of your city look like? Do you have a personal favourite you think is really unknown? Any maps that you just want to rant about because of how terrible it is?

My personal favourite transit map is Constantine Konovalov's Paris Metro Map, I just love how effortlessly it weaves the lines throughout the Peripherique, and how it's not afraid to break its own established rules on angles and circles. Honorable mentions go to the London Tube and Rail map (an absolute classic), and the Mexico City Metro, which assigns a unique symbol to every station for the benefit of passengers who can't read or write.

Also, designers, feel free to share your transit diagrams! I miss r/transitdiagrams a lot and would love to see your work, fictional, redesign or otherwise!

Where do you share the art that you make with the world? Do you use a social media site? A personal website? Do you keep it all to yourself? Is your art something that can't be shared online so easily?

I have been a product designer and experience architect since before “UX” even meant anything.

I’ve never wanted for work, and I’ve always been confident in my skills as a leader both on the product and business strategy side.

But especially recently, I’ve started to feel some tremors I’ve never felt before:

1. A massive amount of young talent has flooded the industry via UX programs and boot camps - and much of them are quite talented!
2. Layoffs have further upped the available workers
3. AI and Automation have made good designers even more efficient, and even inexperienced designers can now move at the speed of light.

I also have some personal situations at play:

1. I took the last few years to launch and grow my own product business - scaling that eventually to an exit. So I’ve been out of the “product designer” game a bit - as I’ve been immersed in everything that comes with being a founder and startup growth.
2. I now have a family - I can’t grind as hard as I used to.

All this gives me some qualms about the ability to find work in the future.

With an industry now flooded in talent, and AI that commodifies and democratizes UI design - making it easier than ever to spit out good design - is there job security for product designers the next few years?

What does that look like? How will pay be affected? Where will the opportunity be?