'Web design is boring'
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- cherub
This article might be silly but it got me thinking about some things that hadn't occured to me before. I mean, who's really at fault for an internet that looks "eerily the same wherever you go?"
http://thenextweb.com/opinion/20…
I have this nagging suspicion that if money were out of the equation altogether, that people would just make websites for the sake of it, or for the sake of art. The right reasons. The article is claiming we "commoditized" the web, and I think I agree. We've allowed people to have this unfair expectation that every website has to allow the visitor to do things they've come to expect, like have share buttons to FB and Twitter, or something that resembles something commercial.
I blame capitalism.
- hotroddy4
I blame phones. Everything has to scroll in a small box.
- Not sure how relevant that isset
- It's this. Which, you can't really get away from.section_014
- utopian3
I blame Adobe and Apple.
- cherub0
And that's the other thing, every fucking website wants you to download an app. Great.
- Beeswax4
Little fan boys who danced around when they decided to kill Flash.
- inteliboy3
The web is better looking than it has ever been. Rose tinted nostalgia glasses
Though I do agree somewhat. I can't remember the last time I saw a website that just existed to be a website.
- pablo282
Design isn’t Art
https://medium.com/learning-ux/d…
- Continuity3
I blame this raging shitcunt.
- I fixed him
http://i.imgur.com/q…set - Haha!Continuity
- ahha set :Dsted
- I fixed him
- hans_glib0
yup i totally agree. the good old days of mad experimentation like hell.com are long gone
i read somewhere that these days the internet is effectively controlled by a bunch of 20-30year old (mainly white) men in silicon valley...
- yeah, if only the internet was controlled by mainly brown and yellow men, will be living in Utopia, Utopiaaaaaa eheheh :)GeorgesII
- GeorgesII0
long rant incoming:
Hey this is GXIII from the future and I blame no one,The reason most webdesigner find the current state of web desing boring is because they are still stuck creating and browsing web through a computer/phone screen.
the true experimental stuff escaped the web a few years ago,
example:
I've been working with chatbots all week and trying to give them emotions and allow them to connect and communicate will all the web enabled devices,Let's give an example.
I want to browse qbn,
U = user
B = bot
D= deviceU: Open QBN
B: Where would you like to browse QBN.
U: Open "pic of the day" on the living room screen and sort by newest.
B: Ok, done
D: Living room activated and redirected to POTD
--
U: Can you also queue the last 10 Videos from "What are you listening to" on my running playlist
B: Ok, done
D: New video added to your playlist and available in all your connected players under "running" playlist
--
in the meantime, you will receive visual responses from your bot controller to make sure everything is fine.Do I want to go back to doing cutting hedge webpages, yes, but I find it utterly boring because I see it as limiting :/
- yep, it's just become another tv channel... hence the general dullnesshans_glib
- but the topic is about web design.fadein11
- ^ you still need to design the interface, the medium has changed, the same experimental thing you could do by killing the ram in chrome, you can now do byGeorgesII
- allowing multiple device to connect to the web and serve you everything you want, just that now its not only stuck on a computer screen. so web design is stillGeorgesII
- here, but it has become lazy because there is a device fatigueGeorgesII
- So, web design becomes boring and repetitive because of the devices? Same design on a wall would be less boring?sr_rosa
- I think you're totally missing my point, device has become "boring" because the devices ecosystem was evolving faster than the web technology, so to make sureGeorgesII
- you could run everything on 20 different devices you had to limit the experimental (aka nice crazy design) to the minimum. Now currently the web is in a crisisGeorgesII
- because there's a device fatigue, you can design all the most crazy website and interaction but what's the point when only a fifth of the device will be able toGeorgesII
- view them as they are supposed to be viewed. So this is why it has become boring. I'm just giving you an example of what devs are doing right now which will givGeorgesII
- you a totally different experience. both can still use well designed interfaces, but what's the point when most people don't really careGeorgesII
- oooh and the main reason why we are stuck here is because apple killed flash, so there's wasn't an unified format to push crazy experiential designs on,GeorgesII
- People have never cared about design. But if designers don't care about design, is a huge problem.
Make the web blink again.sr_rosa - I see what where you're going and I agree, but the task become a lot more tedious when you actually have to build those crazy webpage and lost nights because IEGeorgesII
- 10 doesn't allow PNGs or safari still won't allow anything else than iframe in IOS, the thought alone gives me goosebumps ehehheGeorgesII
- It's tedious? Come on!
IT'S OUR FUCKING WORK!!!sr_rosa - TBH, I gave up two years ago and my bank account has never been happier heheheGeorgesII
- We used to spend a lot of time after work learning and discussing design. Now we want someone on stackoverflow to solve our problems.
I blame CandyCrush.sr_rosa - nah, I blame steve jobs for shutting down flash before we had a viable alternative, so much chaos enssuedGeorgesII
- sr_rosa3
- woooooow, my mind was blown ehehheGeorgesII
- 2001, one of the first sites made with Flash I remembersr_rosa
- Which was still Macromedia'ssr_rosa
- a gem!akiersky
- wow...it has been a while since that kinda stuff, doesn't make sense!valentim
- Who needs sense having music and animation and awesomeness all over the place?!?!?sr_rosa
- Awwww, I remember them! Almost as good as Ego Media's site's intro. hahahaMondoMorphic
- Love that hi-pitched bass drum sound when you scroll over the links in the showroom section. About time for that audio fx trend to come back.fruitsalad
- That was one of the top of the top at the time, it was amazing. something was happening at that time. Good time, good memories.Bennn
- There was the feeling of anything was possible - while sitting at your 400mhz pc - the feeling that you alone could create something innovate and not seen b4.fruitsalad
- cherub0
Let me ask everyone a question. What do you hope to accomplish when someone lands on your webpage? And, in what ways has this changed since the early days of the internet?
Hans_Glib you mentioned experimentation, and I agree we are free to experiment. But only to the extent that in the client's mind, there is already an expectation the 'standard' site will include the cookie cutter formulaic bullshit that kills creativity. Does every site NEED all these indispensables that we assume are a given?
Example: what if a landscaping company had a website that only consisted of a 3D virtual tour of a huge, nice looking flowerbed/rose garden with the ability to zoom in all the way to the insides of the bark and stuff. The company would scoff, but who's wrong? After all, if you reveal EVERYTHING about your company online, where is the incentive for the customers to show up in person? They're killing their own business.
- Maaku0
Not sure "boring" is the correct word but the cause might be a mix of needing responsive websites, the overused frameworks like bootstrap and the cheap/free templates that are based on those frameworks, and everyone using unsplash.com for their hero images.
- yepfadein11
- leave unsplash alone!!!! lol_niko
- Hahahaha poor unsplashcherub
- https://unsplash.com…bklyndroobeki
- Maaku0
Also, a lot of Saas websites use these frameworks (materialize, boostrap, foundation) in their early stages to speed up prototyping because they're focusing on making the product work instead of thinking about how cool or unique the app should look.
- nocomply0
A commercial website is a communication and engagement tool.
To me the best websites are the ones that put the needs, emotions, and end goals of their users first.
Sometimes you can use a pre-developed template to accomplish that, but oftentimes it requires the design and development of a custom UI and custom functionality. That's where the creative problem solving happens and that's what continues to keep me interested in the game.
Of course there's going to be a lot of abused and misguided template usage that leads to these sweeping generalizations. But our job is to rise above that and create something of value and something worthy of the user's time and attention.
- _niko0
I think Georges is on to something, same sort of epiphany when I was in art school and realized how boring and limiting painting had become because you're unnecessarily tied to a flat canvas.
If the medium is the message, what are you trying to say by putting pigment on stretched canvas?
Conceptual, 3d, environmental and experiential art on the other hand were boundless and could communicate their message much more efficiently.
I should be able to go the the grocery store, pick up a box of cookies and ask when were these made, do they have favourable reviews or where can i find them at a cheaper price without having to login and search your phone for the answers.
maybe contact lenses that display augmented reality and speak to you via an ear implant or something.
Then again, we're a little freaked out about the government having control of our smart cars and our smart houses, imagine what they could do with 'smart' people lol.
- utopian3
- he's truly a visionary._niko
- I <3 you, Brett Bash!Continuity
- I've invited him three times to come back to QBN since we opened new memberships again, but he's never come back. :'(Continuity
- BB broke the internet over here for a second.shellie
- He's too busy hanging with Jesus to be here with the plebs.face_melter
- Bennn-1
The last time a website made me go "Whoa! This is cool!" was when http://www.bloomberg.com/ was launch about a year ago. And it was my first "Whoa!" in a VERY long time.
- fate2
The developers won.
They got exactly the type of web they wants and always railed against the creative types and designers for not bending to.
It's turned the web into the 21st century equivalent of the yellowpages.
- This is, unfortunately, the truth.Continuity
- function over form_niko
- also clients won. There are tons of cool sites on awwwards, but they cost 100k +, clients want a wix site for $200 and it's good enough for them_niko
- Also, Jakob Fucking 'I Hate Things That Look Good' Nielsen won. Fucking cunt.Continuity
- Yup, he most have been drooling when responsive, formulaic websites started to be in demandformed