Nicci Yin

Nicci Yin is an interaction designer and artist, and runs SHIFT CMD, a research & design practice whose projects ask what else computing could feel like. She creates conceptual art about software and produces prototypes, videos, writing, and workshops that defamiliarize everyday computational behavior.

She most recently worked as a Research Designer at Reality Labs Research at Meta, where she developed deep expertise in UX for contextual AI systems, and was a Y12 Incubator Member at NEW INC. Her work has been presented internationally at Ars Electronica, MAAT, and Abierto Mexicano de Diseño, and published in the Are.na Annual and The HTML Review.

Selected Projects

Afterimages

2026

A website for The HTML Review Spring 2026 issue that revists camera roll memories as tiles of blue, exploring translation between image, color, and text, and between an experience and its record, my recall and machine interpretation.

Reflections

Are.na Annual: Pools 2026

A conversational essay written with Stephanie Marie Cedeño about reflection pools and their function as spectacle, contemplation, and a metaphor for AI. Edited by Meg Miller and Amirio Freeman.

a cloud a day

2025

A different kind of "weather app" that draws a new cloud every day, after Yoko Ono's Cloud Piece. Add your own cloud to the Are.na channel.

Cursor Spotlight

2025

A Chrome extension that creates a spotlight around the cursor, making the browsing/reading experience feel like a discovery. Adjust your spotlight and try light and dark modes!

Site Studies ✺

2025—

An ongoing exercise to explore websites as a medium using self-initiated prompts. These quick sketches imagine alternative interfaces: websites that you just stare at, websites that only listen, websites you have to care for, and more.

WikiGarden

2025

A location-based phone game for WikiGameJam 2025 that turns the world's knowledge into a living garden. Players collect “seeds” from Wikipedia article locations, and watch them blossom into unique flowers.

Welcome to Formosa

2025

A video essay reflecting on Animal Crossing, COVID, and the care/control of islands using personal "found footage" screenshots between 2020–2024.

Networked Colluding @ Ars Electronica

Exhibit, 2017

Installation of our collaborative work Networked Colluding at Ars Electronica about solving a neighborhood mystery through a network of IoT devices. Collaboration with Stephanie Marie Cedeño.

RECENT UPDATES

03 July 2026 — New Neighbors @ Processing Community Day Taiwan

Joining a panel with amazing creative coders and artists on local and global exchange between Taiwan and our neighbors, organized by SpOnAct: livestream and recording.

28 June 2026 — Workshop @ Index

I taught 'Tending the Webpage' at the end of June at Index Greenpoint, a workshop for the design- and code-curious to build tools in HTML/CSS/JS for tending and growing a shared webpage together. More info soon.

20 May 2026 — Talk @ Claude Code Taipei

I gave a talk at a Claude Meetup hosted by Natalie Feng Lin for artists and designers: myself and three artists shared our process and reflections working with Claude in our projects. Write-up in Chinese of all the presentations here and link to my deck here.

13 Sept 2025 – ART POTLUCK

My friends and I organized this multimedia, multisensory art pop-up at The Grocery. We envisioned this as a gathering of friends and the work that we make, and created a space to share projects with each other and our communities.

Links, Contact, Other Things