Founder of... Dear Reader, With all the hype around the new role designer/builder, it's worth looking at what that role looks like when you cut out the middle man. By that I mean, you build for yourself rather than your employer. I saved this on my Tumblr back in 2014: Think about how much harder it was to become a designer/founder in 2014 vs. 2026. That's great news, but the bad news is that the title "designer" has never been more uncertain. I'm bullish on designers in the age of AI. I'm...

How the Fountain Institute Started and Where It's Going by Jeff Humble Dear Reader, In case you missed it, Hannah dropped a pretty big announcement in the last newsletter. I wanted to tell the story of how the Fountain Institute started, why we’ve never had an “About Us” page, and where I think we’re headed next. How it started The Fountain Institute started when two friends decided to grab a beer and work...then kept doing it for 7 years. There were many false starts along the way. Starting...

A goodbye and the story that goes with it By Hannah Baker Dear Reader, There's an idea I've been chasing for most of my working life, and I didn't know it. I want to tell you about it, and about something that happened a few years ago that I haven't talked about much publicly, but that belongs in this story. Some of you might already know this about me, but I used to work in education departments at museums. The thing that grabbed me in the museums was a shift that happened, away from the...