Hot Box Your Uber? Rate Your Neighbor on Zillow? A Designer Reimagines Popular Apps

Soren Iverson’s satirical concepts for new app features highlight our hidden fears and desires—and have gone viral on Twitter.

Soren Iverson credits Spotify for his inspiration, if “credits” is the right word.

In 2015, Spotify introduced Wrapped, an end-of-year summary that provided users with insights into their music habits and highlighted the year’s top artists. The concept was soon adopted by other brands as a clever way to boost engagement. This December, Iverson, a digital designer, wondered what a Wrapped feature would look like for everyday apps.

Using Figma, Iverson created mockups for Google Maps, Robinhood, and Starbucks Wrapped and shared them on Twitter. The posts gained moderate attention, but Iverson was just beginning. Since then, he has been sharing imaginative new features for popular apps almost daily. These include ChatGPT in Apple Messages, Instagram with an option to undo “deep likes” for a fee, and Tinder reviews à la Lyft (“Looked Like Pics!”). His ideas that went viral: playing Minesweeper to cancel subscriptions and iOS alarms for the whole household, where the alarm stops only once everyone is awake.

Iverson’s satirical app designs started showing up frequently on my Twitter feed, though it’s unclear whether this is due to their viral success or changes in Twitter’s algorithm—or perhaps both. Curious about his design process, I reached out to Iverson, who works full-time as a designer at Cash App when he’s not reimagining popular apps. We discussed how tech companies are reacting to his ideas and what the popularity of his quirky concepts says about our relationship with technology. He even mentioned that an Instagram engineer was so impressed by one of his ideas that they considered pitching it internally.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

WIRED: What inspired you to start sharing these app concepts?

Soren Iverson: A few years ago, Spotify’s Wrapped feature was a huge hit from a product management perspective. People loved it, and now it seems like every product manager is trying to replicate that success with their own apps. By December, it felt like everyone was jumping on this trend. So I thought, as a thought experiment, what if Starbucks did this? What if DoorDash or Google Maps did this? I wanted to play with the idea of using internal metrics, like how many miles you’ve driven or cups of coffee you’ve ordered, and reflecting them back to users.

I think visually, so I quickly mocked up these ideas in my head and shared them. People found it funny, and it just took off.

Initially, my approach was something like “This product, plus this feature or UI.” But now it’s more like, “What if a product manager knew Figma really well and unleashed their most absurd ideas on an app?” It’s been a lot of fun, especially riffing with people like Josh Rozin and Gauthier Le Meur, who sometimes send me ideas that are just crazy.

WIRED: I only recently discovered your work in the past couple of months, but I’m seeing it more and more on my feed, just like other Twitter personalities such as menswear writer Derek Guy or therapist Nicole LePera. It makes me wonder if the algorithm is pushing these topics at me—or if Elon Musk is tweaking the feed to show us more of his interests.

Iverson: I’m glad you’re enjoying the app ideas! It’s interesting how these things spread, but who knows what’s driving the visibility—it could be the algorithm or just people sharing things they find amusing.

I’ve seen people mentioning that Elon complained about his posts not getting enough attention, and now their feed is almost all Elon tweets. That’s one way to handle it, I guess. It’s interesting because sometimes my designs stay within the Design Twittersphere, but occasionally, like with the Group Alarms or Uber Hot Box ideas, they break out of Tech Twitter and things can spiral. Now I have to be more explicit that everything is satirical because I don’t want to mislead anyone. I thought these concepts were so absurd that no one would take them seriously, but I’m being clearer about that moving forward.

WIRED: You say your designs are satirical, but are they really? For example, the idea that Tinder users should know how many people someone is dating—that’s funny, but it’s not entirely satirical.

Iverson: That’s the tricky part. It’s a fine line. And it raises the question of whether this is art. If I’m putting something out there without explaining it and letting people interpret it, that’s similar to what artists do. Most people don’t think of Big Tech product design as an art form. I wouldn’t call myself an “artist” because that sounds pretentious, and this is something anyone can do—take an idea and tweak it a bit. To me, it’s more like comedy. It brings some lightness, which is a nice break from all the serious stuff going on. For me, it’s about putting play back into work.

WIRED: What’s your favorite app feature you’ve come up with so far?

Iverson: Ummm …

WIRED: I know, it’s like choosing your favorite child.

Iverson: Exactly! You can’t choose your favorite kid. It’s funny because the ones I think are really good don’t always resonate with a wider audience.

WIRED: That happens with news stories too!

Iverson: I think my favorite is the TicketMaster one. It really got people worked up and blurred the line between reality and satire.

WIRED: Have any app companies contacted you about actually building one of your concepts?

Iverson: The “Pay to Undo Deep Likes” idea for Instagram got some attention. “Deep Likes” refers to accidentally liking an old photo while browsing someone’s profile. My concept was that you could undo it discreetly for a small fee. An engineering manager at Instagram mentioned they were considering pitching it internally—minus the payment part. That’s the closest I’ve come to seeing one of my ideas potentially become a reality.

WIRED: What do your designs say about our current app experiences and our relationship with technology?

Iverson: Everyone interprets them differently. Some of my friends outside the tech industry either find these concepts hilarious or feel they have a “Black Mirror” vibe. It made me realize how thin the line is between our everyday tech use and dystopian scenarios. Even small changes, like adding Slack read receipts, can have huge impacts. People were furious about that idea, even though it’s a common feature on Microsoft Teams and WhatsApp. Someone joked it could lead to a “white collar revolt.”

WIRED: Art used to be placed in specific contexts—like radio, TV, or billboards. But now technology is everywhere and part of our daily lives.

Iverson: Exactly. These small tweaks to apps we use every day can create big shifts in how we interact with technology.

WIRED: It seems like your “DMV in the Metaverse” concept didn’t resonate as much as your mobile app ideas. Do you think it’s because the metaverse already feels so absurd that it doesn’t need satire to highlight its oddities?

Iverson: I think that’s part of it. The metaverse already feels so detached that it doesn’t need additional exaggeration to seem surreal. Plus, it’s important to have a clear focal point. Ideas like “Play Minesweeper to Cancel Subscription” or “Snap Map for the Chinese Spy Balloon” have a central, easy-to-grasp concept. With hardware or metaverse ideas, people don’t always connect immediately.

WIRED: Have you thought about using generative AI tools to create these designs?

Iverson: No, I haven’t. Partly because I want to future-proof my career and partly because it feels inauthentic. I’ve seen others use it, but I’ve stuck to doing things manually. Right now, design tools still require specific skills, but that could change. With tools like Galileo, where you can type a prompt and it generates a UI, the barrier to entry will lower. I’ve wondered if anyone is training a model based on my designs. It would definitely be interesting if that happened.