>This reads like a summary of what most are already doing. I can't shake the feeling some of these wisdoms could trendy things that are just part of the herd mentality that plagues UI design.

This basically describes all of Babich's writing. He even names some of his articles "Popular Trends in..." or "Popular Techniques for...", but basically all of them are more or less a recap of what's trendy in one facet of UI/UX design.