In a world increasingly influenced by a couple of big players and where AI is becoming a staple in our toolkit, the need for interoperability has never been more critical. In this talk, I'll delve into why open standards are vital to a healthy digital product design ecosystem.
We don't have to look far to see why openness matters. Companies like Microsoft, now the largest contributor to open source on the planet, were historically hostile toward open standards, and have gradually opened up to them. Not just as a goodwill gesture, but as a strategic move to thrive in a diverse ecosystem. This is equally necessary for us in the realm of design.
Open standards (like design tokens) do more than help make the market competitive: it also opens the door for a rich ecosystem of tools and plugins. These can easily plug into our workflows and automate away tasks that aren't as creative, while also raising the bar for quality. It's like having a common language that every tool understands. This way, we can focus on what's really important: building the best user experiences.