# The best designers do not hand off taste ## Story option The best designers do not hand off taste. They shape the thing until it feels right. For too long, software forced designers to work through proxies: files, mockups, specs, tickets, screenshots, comments, and hope. That era is ending. Mode puts designers back in contact with the product itself. ## Notes - Preserves Alex's current correction: the story is about designers shaping software itself, not only functional product editing. - Keeps the enemy on handoff culture, translation loss, static representation, and files/proxies replacing the product. - Do not frame engineers as the villain; use the launch spine to keep engineering review in the loop.