These discussions seems to have zeroed in on the Junior aspect of my original comment, which — ironically — I only added as a kind of a throwaway side thought, rather than the main reason I posted the article.

In saying that, it's actually a really interesting discussion to have. It's also given me a chance to really put some thoughts I have had about the topic to words. Sorry if it sounds like I'm banging on.

With regard to your points - Sure. That is all true, it is a more accessible exercise. That I don't disagree with at all. Not just for Juniors but all designers. Otherwise there wouldn't be so many of them. I'm just of the opinion that spending time on the simpler and more accessible exercise doesn't nessessarily make better designers. I'd argue it wouldn't look as good for a junior to have a portfolio filled with context free, unsolicited redesigns compared to one with some real world projects. Whether those projects are success' or failures. There are far more lessons to learn in that process, and far more to show for your efforts.

That was mostly the angle I was coming from, but perhaps I poorly explained that?

This actually all brings up one of my great frustrations with our field in recent years. Seemingly, there seems to be this idea amongst people entering the profession — and some of those giving advice to them — that doing this kind of "redesign" work, and then posting to Instagram, Dribbble, or Medium, will get you hired by the very companies they are "redesigning". It probably won't. In fact, statistically, it almost certainly won't. For every person who does a "redesign" and gets hired from it, there are hundreds, if not thousands who won't.

The point of posting this article (I'm not the author) was more about helping get designers to help causes that need it, and direct their energies away from the simpler exercise of doing redesigns. Doing the harder thing is often the better thing. Particularly if the thinking is that it will get them work/jobs/clients.