Why is website design so awful today, generally?

[redheeler]

bad website design:
View attachment 776753
who scored the top points?
who scored the bottom points?
ahh, you do the math!

It did take me a moment to realize this - so you're right, it's bad design. And the fix is incredibly simple too: put a small team icon next to each table row.

I don't see anything wrong with modern web design in general. Only when designers don't spend enough time thinking about how to make things look and feel better do problems like this arise.

For example: Whoever designed the iMac Pro website seriously thought the iMac Pro specs should be advertised using giant bold headers that scroll over an image of the iMac? One of the most ugly design choices I have ever seen on a modern website.

The 2018 MacBook Pro website shows better user experience and design choices than the iMac Pro website. Maybe it was the result of Apple's web team thinking about and improving on their earlier work.

 

[Tozovac]

I know this is all repeat but I so love todays websites more than the olden days when the UI was designed by non UI experts, often computer engineers who have a mind that only works for other engineers. It used to be a mess with functions and little buttons all over the place. Give me this minimalist look that only provides you what you need when you need. So much better.

It's funny how we both say we want the same things but apply those wants completely differently. When I want what I need when I need it, I don't want to have to go on a scroll search down a 100' tall website full of white space and large images just to find what I want. I want obvious links/buttons out in the open and not buried behind hamburger icons. When I want to search for something, like I do at most every site, I want a search window up top, not one buried behind a spyglass icon that requires another click to start entering text in the search window. I'd be curious to see your version of a site with buttons all over the place. I'll start seeking taking screenshots of websites that went to the minimalist blue/grey on white flat design aesthetic such that everything useful seems hidden away and needing searching to find.

Apple's user community help forum was once arranged rather efficiently for intuitive use. Space was effectively used and different areas clearly showed different functions. Lots of helpful tools ou in the open. Now it's a very basic and scroll-heavy dumbed-down space-wasting setup, with key functions/tools/resources hidden away that used to be in the side borders. That is good design? Apple was afraid users were "distracted" but valuable tools? Completely unnecessary website reinvention, and an "awful" website compared to before.

But anyway...

You pointed to a blog in this post:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/common-webpage-design-mistakes.2134168/#post-26391457

Blog: http://blog-en.tilda.cc/articles-website-design-mistakes

I disagree with so many of his "rules." His blog should be titled "My opinion on how to implement today's fad of space-wasting scroll-heavy websites."

I need to find a "good" site or sites to point to, which contradict most if not all of his mobile-first scroll-heavy "rules" for good design. Meanwhile, my thoughts on his "rules," all 1/2 cents worth. Go to any page on Amazon for an item for sale. Those pages have not changed drastically just to follow faddish designs, and they follow few of the blog author's "rules for good website design."

Example:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B...beb-4819111bef9a&pf_rd_r=5S1KF00P7FT1A2B0WCVQ
So this fellow's list of "new age" good website design rules...my scrolling finger hurts after navigating his site after so much unnecessary scrolling action...

#2 is plain wrong and one of the issues I take with today's websites. With even spacing above/below "key areas," you often are unsure whether a non-button actionable-text-element is for something above or below it. Also when framing a picture, decades of learning have resulted in having less space above a photo, within a mat/frame, and more space below... Note that the above contradicts #2 further below, for "Mistakes in Article Design," as does #4 just below in "Mistakes in Article Design," where it'd be better if the photo was closer to the text to which the photo applies...

#3 is plain wrong, and proof that artificial padding is added often, unnecessarily. The "wrong" example on the left is much better than the "right' example on the right. Less wasted space, more to see at one page load/scroll.

#4 avoid low contrast? Agree! But if only everyone followed that rule...low-contrast grey/light-blue text on white is just awful and needs to go away.

#5 is nitpicking if taken too literally that also results in stale-looking websites. Following #5 too closely has resulted in things like iOS11's awful system of look-alike apps from Apple that are often indistinguishable at first glance. A useless "standard."

On one hand, an illustration and its caption form a whole but these are two separate elements, and captions should not interfere with images.

The caption sticks to the image and we have trouble properly engaging with either of them. There is a lot of white space between the image and its caption, yet it's clear that the caption goes with the image.

THIS is why we have awful websites and iOS 7 today. Completely made-up “issues” that users supposedly have, just so a designer can force his agenda. The user has trouble properly engaging with either... Are you kidding me? And here it is in black-and-white, more intentional white space.


#9...can you hear my eyes rolling from wherever you are? THIS is one of the worst suggestions for good website design... "Essential part" of an image...how essential is a large photo of a pretty face as far as the purpose of that example website? My biggest critique of today's websites is wasted energy/focus that distracts the user from getting their business done...

#11 has merit, good job. iOS7 ruined the experience by eliminating padding, from Jony's war on buttons & helpful UIx contexts. Someone at Apple has woken up, as iOS11 is veering closer to "good" UIx, including using padding effectively.

#14 to me is suggesting "just stick with monochromatic text on stark white backgrounds, mmmmkay??" Another critique of today's websites. Too stale, too alike, too boring.

#15 is the SECOND BIGGEST MISTAKE TO GOOD WEBSITE DESIGN. Is this guy serious, as far as his explanation?

He says:

"People visit websites to find solutions to their problems. Help them! Use the menu to help people navigate the website and find what they need quickly and easily. Don't overload them with with excessive information. It's enough to have 5-7 menu items."

How about:

"People visit websites to find solutions to their problems efficiently. Help them, don't entertain them! Provide a menu at the top of the screen that's seen upon the initial page load, to help people navigate the website and find what they need quickly and easily. Provide a search window in plain view that the user can type in instantly, and provide enough key menu items that aren't buried behind other menu items. Don't make the user click on a spyglass to make the search window appear which must then be clicked on a second time to enter search criteria."

#5 down below in "mistakes in Article Design" is plain wrong. The example on the left is easier to comprehend relationships quickly, while the one on the right promotes the unnecessary "more white space" garbage design.

"There is a lot of white space between the image and its caption, yet it's clear that the caption goes with the image"

(gag....)

#14 Headline appears too close to the image.
More unnecessary but intentional space-wasting.

Oh well, enough of this guy's poisoning today's youth. Hopefully his blog will fade away like today's faddish designs, and sooner than later.
[doublepost=1535476089][/doublepost]

It did take me a moment to realize this - so you're right, it's bad design. And the fix is incredibly simple too: put a small team icon next to each table row.

Exactly. Most every bad example I come across is missing certain basic, helpful cues that used to be standard. It's almost as if helping the user has been deemed unnecessary, suddenly (starting in 2013 with iOS7 actually). Jony Ive saying "users no longer need such affordances" around 2013 has cascaded out of control...

For example: Whoever designed the iMac Pro website seriously thought the iMac Pro specs should be advertised using giant bold headers that scroll over an image of the iMac? One of the most ugly design choices I have ever seen on a modern website.

That's an amazingly awfully-designed website. Wow. From Apple, to boot.

The 2018 MacBook Pro website shows better user experience and design choices than the iMac Pro website. Maybe it was the result of Apple's web team thinking about and improving on their earlier work.

Agree. Could do without the grand animation upon load...like an owner of a recently-remodeled kitchen giving you the grand tour...once is enough, not at every single entry. Annoying to a user looking for productivity, but a portfolio-builder for the designer. Try moving down the page using your mouse scroll wheel, which animates the grand presentation instead of moving you down the page. Useless, pompous, awful website "feature” that seems to be more about showing off design skills than showing off a product.

 

[m00min]

In my experience websites that utilise large stock photos are often there at the insistence of a marketing team, not necessarily the designer.

 

[Tozovac]

In my experience websites that utilise large stock photos are often there at the insistence of a marketing team, not necessarily the designer.

Isn't that like saying a mother is more of a parent than the father, or vice versa?

Regardless of whether a designer or marketer or other ultimate corporate decision maker made the final call, they're all designers in the sense of being part of the entity that made the website. Whoever has the ultimate say (and/or who ultimately provides permission to proceed) is to "blame."

 

[m00min]

Isn't that like saying a mother is more of a parent than the father, or vice versa?

Regardless of whether a designer or marketer or other ultimate corporate decision maker made the final call, they're all designers in the sense of being part of the entity that made the website. Whoever has the ultimate say (and/or who ultimately provides permission to proceed) is to "blame."

I was just attempting to correct you on your mistaken blame of web designers for your so called bad design. I’ve got a fix for you to make all those large images and spacing go away, just add to your browser’s settings:

* { display: none; }

Should work wonders.

 

[Tozovac]

bad website design:
View attachment 776753
who scored the top points?
who scored the bottom points?
ahh, you do the math!

Saw this on Facebook this evening, someone posted:

Now, my thread was titled “awful websites,” but much of my critiques also apply to today’s awful design trends in apps and mobile operating systems... all morphed towards completely unnecessary reinventions of what used to be clear and intuitive ways of doing things. Looking at this screenshot somebody posted of an app, it requires time to process what’s presented.

What is the significance of APP being gray and PSU being black?
What does the “10” next to PSU mean?
One score is 38, one is 45, ok but what’s the meaning of one being gray and one black?
What’s meaningful about ”0-1” being lighter grey that APP?
And, what’s the meaning of the arrow pointing to Penn State score?

How is this better than the classic method of stacking the two team scores above each other, for rapid understanding? All it is is different, not better.

THIS is a great example of what’s wrong with much of today’s website design. Unecesssry reinventions that are less easy to understand, requiring pauses to figure things out that add up quite noticeably to the point of frustration. And here in this case, I am left not understanding half of what is being presented.

Can anyone quickly understand?

Also, how is providing a underline rather far away from the “selected item” better than the prior way of bolding the text or showing a box or “indentation” or an other obvious coloring or shading around the selected item? Answer: google had to come up with a different looking operating system than iOS, which at one time was best in class. Google UIx/design was never best in class, just different. Now, downstream designers around the world took the worst of iOS and google material design to keep up with the big boys, creating abominations like the above.

Again, can anyone defend the above way of doing things compared to what was typical five years ago? What was wrong when and what does the above example fix? What is the meaning of it other than to say it’s something different to look at?

 

[cyb3rdud3]

It happened five years ago as well, and many years before that. It’s just bad, bad in a way that only the person who created it thinks it looks good.

Don’t think it’s a particular example of why everything is bad nowadays as it simply isn’t.

 

[theresuh187]

Did you ever find a solution to this? I'm currently where you are. I am so frustrated trying to shop online. I can only view a few items at a time on many sites, forgetting what I looked at and constantly scrolling back and forth, taking screenshots so I can have some options laid out in front of me. I'm on Ebay right now and can only see three items at a time out of thousands. Imagine if shopping was like that in physical stores, it would never work so why is it ok online.

I am SO annoyed. I'm pretty sure it's either a scheme for businesses to only give us the options they want to sell the most or developers trying to be unique to give their resumes an edge. Either way I feel like consumers are completely cast out of the agenda, even though we are the ones paying all their bills.

 

[Eightarmedpet]

Did you ever find a solution to this? I'm currently where you are. I am so frustrated trying to shop online. I can only view a few items at a time on many sites, forgetting what I looked at and constantly scrolling back and forth, taking screenshots so I can have some options laid out in front of me. I'm on Ebay right now and can only see three items at a time out of thousands. Imagine if shopping was like that in physical stores, it would never work so why is it ok online.

I am SO annoyed. I'm pretty sure it's either a scheme for businesses to only give us the options they want to sell the most or developers trying to be unique to give their resumes an edge. Either way I feel like consumers are completely cast out of the agenda, even though we are the ones paying all their bills.

So you are saying you can digest 1000's of image of products at the same time and it wouldn't be visual overload?

It's not a scheme to limit choices, it's design thats informed by user testing, sounds like you are in a very small minority of people who prefer things smaller.

 

[cyb3rdud3]

So you are saying you can digest 1000's of image of products at the same time and it wouldn't be visual overload?

It's not a scheme to limit choices, it's design thats informed by user testing, sounds like you are in a very small minority of people who prefer things smaller.

Agreed, or have a way too low resolution screen so everything appears bigger. Modern responsive sites are fully scaleable, so that when you use browser zoom as part of accessibility features you can choose how much you see or don’t see.

 

[theresuh187]

So you are saying you can digest 1000's of image of products at the same time and it wouldn't be visual overload?

It's not a scheme to limit choices, it's design thats informed by user testing, sounds like you are in a very small minority of people who prefer things smaller.

[doublepost=1541215504][/doublepost]I must be. I’d like online stores to mimic physical stores at least a little bit. In physical stores I can see everything in my cart at a time, online I can only see about three, which makes it hard to sift through items and make decisions. I can scan an area of many items within seconds in a physical store, online I’m scrolling every three items, usually forgetting what I already viewed and scrolling back and forth, many times losing the page I was on. I’m very forgetful and indecisive so the popular layout doesn’t work for me at all. I guess I’m the small fraction. No one else I know gets frustrated over it except whoever started this thread. I really thought more people would dislike it as much as I do. Majority rules , though so I’ll have to just deal.

 

[smirking]

[doublepost=1541215504][/doublepost]online I can only see about three, which makes it hard to sift through items and make decisions.

You only see three items? Is your screen tiny or do you have the images blown up?

Most of the time, I'm using an LG 5K. I see plenty.

 

[Tozovac]

Looks like Apple recently "improved" their refurbished sales area with the same vague-ugly stick they swatted their user help community with several years ago. Larger representations of items for sale with lots of wasted white space, coupled with providing less information differentiating each of the fewer items seen on the screen at one time. And this is a desktop view by the way, not mobile-first silliness.

Looking at the MBA's for example, what are the differences between the three 1.8GHz i5's? How easy will it now to shop for the SSD & RAM & model year differences beyond a whack-a-mole "click and discover" approach of opening then closing then repeating then trying to remember what you just looked at 15 seconds ago.

THIS is a prime example of awful web design today, and from the Design Gods to boot. Awful web design that still hasn't recovered from the dumbified oversized white-out fad started after iOS 7 released the white/grey/flat hounds...designs which now take more space to show less information, with vastly increased ambiguity and more user inconvenience to find what used to be right out in front of the user's eyes.

[doublepost=1542304143][/doublepost]Also, note the "dual-core" "Dual-core" different typos.

Though minor, it reeks of the increased amateurism and detail lapses coming from Apple as of the last 5 years.

 

[smirking]

THIS is a prime example of awful web design today, and from the Design Gods to boot. Awful web design that still hasn't recovered from the dumbified oversized white-out fad started after iOS 7 released the white/grey/flat hounds...designs which now take more space to show less information, with vastly increased ambiguity and more user inconvenience to find what used to be right out in front of the user's eyes.

You're picking the worst page for that layout. If you look at the MacbookPro page, there's a lot less negative space. It works better for most of the other products in the Refurb store. The layout also probably wasn't designed with the refurb store in mind. They wanted to use the same layout they were using elsewhere and it's optimized for those purposes.

While I prefer the old layout that you like and I agree that the way the page is built is awkward, I can explain why that page looks the way it does. They're using standard heights for all of the product rows and when you do that, you often run into a Goldilox problem of the container being too spacious or not spacious enough for specific uses even though on the average it's just right.

Also, I think there's a very good reason they went with these design choices. I don't see signs of normal responsive design elements. It appears to me that they're optimizing their desktop layouts to be iPad centric. A tall container box with lots of room for a big product image and a limited amount of large text works especially well on a tablet device held in portrait orientation and perhaps that's what's really going on with some Web design decisions that we find from Apple that appear like they've forgotten how to design for desktop users. Likely the desktop they're now designing for is one of the larger iPads instead of a laptop.

I'm ok with that. I'm not a fan either, but change happens. It was purposeful too. It just happens to be a purpose that favors some while marginalizing what's important to others. Even a company as big as Apple has to set priorities and make choices.

 

[Altis]

Did you ever find a solution to this? I'm currently where you are. I am so frustrated trying to shop online. I can only view a few items at a time on many sites, forgetting what I looked at and constantly scrolling back and forth, taking screenshots so I can have some options laid out in front of me. I'm on Ebay right now and can only see three items at a time out of thousands. Imagine if shopping was like that in physical stores, it would never work so why is it ok online.

I am SO annoyed. I'm pretty sure it's either a scheme for businesses to only give us the options they want to sell the most or developers trying to be unique to give their resumes an edge. Either way I feel like consumers are completely cast out of the agenda, even though we are the ones paying all their bills.

Some sites force you to view items in some janky javascript box or something rather than letting you load it in a new tab, or navigating 'Back' from an item... or it all loads back to square one after viewing an item, etc...

It's worse on mobile in my experience than desktop. Mobile often forces a certain zoom level, even.

 

[Eightarmedpet]

Looks like Apple recently "improved" their refurbished sales area with the same vague-ugly stick they swatted their user help community with several years ago. Larger representations of items for sale with lots of wasted white space, coupled with providing less information differentiating each of the fewer items seen on the screen at one time. And this is a desktop view by the way, not mobile-first silliness.

Looking at the MBA's for example, what are the differences between the three 1.8GHz i5's? How easy will it now to shop for the SSD & RAM & model year differences beyond a whack-a-mole "click and discover" approach of opening then closing then repeating then trying to remember what you just looked at 15 seconds ago.

THIS is a prime example of awful web design today, and from the Design Gods to boot. Awful web design that still hasn't recovered from the dumbified oversized white-out fad started after iOS 7 released the white/grey/flat hounds...designs which now take more space to show less information, with vastly increased ambiguity and more user inconvenience to find what used to be right out in front of the user's eyes.

View attachment 804317
[doublepost=1542304143][/doublepost]Also, note the "dual-core" "Dual-core" different typos.

Though minor, it reeks of the increased amateurism and detail lapses coming from Apple as of the last 5 years.

You actually make a good point here reg userbility, I’m surprised no one identified that issue, could be solved quite easily with tags which also act as filters.

 

[RedTomato]

You actually make a good point here reg userbility, I’m surprised no one identified that issue, could be solved quite easily with tags which also act as filters.

I'm sympathetic to the overall comments above, but it has been clear for a long time that the less information given, the faster people can process it and come to a decision. The specs are accessible on other pages for these who want to know.

Given it's the refurb page, I guess the primary info: - What's there? How much is it? is all the user needs to make a first cut based on budget.

The differences between the various i5 1.8Ghz models will become clearer after clicking through / opening in a new tab. I would hope that someone would do some basic research if they were spending $800+ but many Apple buyers just pick whatever form factor is available in their budget.

 

[Eightarmedpet]

I'm sympathetic to the overall comments above, but it has been clear for a long time that the less information given, the faster people can process it and come to a decision. The specs are accessible on other pages for these who want to know.

Given it's the refurb page, I guess the primary info: - What's there? How much is it? is all the user needs to make a first cut based on budget.

The differences between the various i5 1.8Ghz models will become clearer after clicking through / opening in a new tab. I would hope that someone would do some basic research if they were spending $800+ but many Apple buyers just pick whatever form factor is available in their budget.

From my first hand experience of shopping the refurb store I feel your assumption that they are supplying enough information is wrong. There are quite often similar priced items with very different spec and for me certain specs are more important than others so I would like a way to compare them before deep diving. Of course you may be correct and I may be an edge case, but even as an edge case adding what I suggested doesn't take anything away from a user who shops purely by budget alone so the value of excluding it is close to nothing (the only case they could put forward is minimal UI but visuals shouldn't be to the detriment of functionality).

If they are working "Agile" this may be the first iteration and what I suggested could be I the next release, but from what I hear they don't, so....

 

[Tozovac]

From my first hand experience of shopping the refurb store I feel your assumption that they are supplying enough information is wrong. There are quite often similar priced items with very different spec and for me certain specs are more important than others so I would like a way to compare them before deep diving. Of course you may be correct and I may be an edge case, but even as an edge case adding what I suggested doesn't take anything away from a user who shops purely by budget alone so the value of excluding it is close to nothing (the only case they could put forward is minimal UI but visuals shouldn't be to the detriment of functionality).

If they are working "Agile" this may be the first iteration and what I suggested could be I the next release, but from what I hear they don't, so....

The desktop site’s prior arrangement was perfectly fine, MUCH more useful informationally and spatially.

As I often ask: who can point out to any aspect of the prior arrangement that was broken? How did the the arrangement fix the broken aspects?

If nobody can provide any answers, or if it appears more is broken/worse now, then what else can be assumed than it was changed For the sake of change, an affliction ruining much of web design, ios, and OS X since 2013?
[doublepost=1542799681][/doublepost]

Given it's the refurb page, I guess the primary info: - What's there? How much is it? is all the user needs to make a first cut based on budget.

The differences between the various i5 1.8Ghz models will become clearer after clicking through / opening in a new tab. I would hope that someone would do some basic research if they were spending $800+ but many Apple buyers just pick whatever form factor is available in their budget.

Wow. You’re a very forgiving person.

 

[Tozovac]

Of course you may be correct and I may be an edge case, but even as an edge case adding what I suggested doesn't take anything away from a user who shops purely by budget alone so the value of excluding it is close to nothing (the only case they could put forward is minimal UI but visuals shouldn't be to the detriment of functionality).

I can't see how you're an edge case.

There's a reason why chicken, pork, and beef aren't packaged in virtually-alike containers so that shoppers could choose by price first, then play the memory/whack-a-mole game iterating to locate what they want, spending more time now than was required before when things were rather refined and just right, with little to nothing broken and in need of major revamping.

If they are working "Agile" this may be the first iteration and what I suggested could be I the next release, but from what I hear they don't, so....

We should be questioning why there even was an iteration away from something that just worked.

When I started this thread, I asked why the mobile experience should be an excuse to derail the desktop experience so badly, for many sites, but this current discussion is about Apple's desktop site for refurb'd products, which absolutely didn't benefit in any way from the current space-wasting whack-a-mole-exploration info-share arrangement.

If I jump back to my very first post in this thread, once again, I ask why have things morphed from smartly organized representations of options that could be taken in/understood quickly, and then lists could be easily sorted by price, if price was a shopper's priority, but then also show certain key specs on the screen at the same time, for efficient and smart function? Like Apple's refurb'd site weeks/months ago.

can anyone answer why websites today tend to have so much wasted space, large text, large photos, and seemingly no organization to steer the user?

...

You have to scroll forever to see everything, and by the time you get to the bottom you've forgotten what existed up on top.

...

Now even your bank's website "treats" you to ... displaying only 50-75% on the screen as what used to be shown, requiring too much additional scrolling than before.

...
Why the lack of gridlines/borders and why all the wasted empty white space at an extreme loss of organization and efficient use?

There's been a definite shift in website design from just a few years ago. Where did this come from?

I can't help but think it's only that designers need to design, and can't leave good things be. Let a beaver run loose at the top of the empire state building and he's going to start looking for wood to build a dam. Or, let Jony run loose at the helm of a wildly successful, useful grouping of tech products having a great balance of functional features/interface elements (hardware & software), and he's only going to start looking for things to minimalize.

Speaking of which, Apple's main page or iphone page is an UNBEARABLE scroll-fest. It's what happens when website Professors/artiste's "improve" things based on theoretical beliefs rather than empirical experience, far away from what used to just work.

Maybe if you're looking to be entertained and have a short attention span, this type of website arrangement is good.

If you're a shopper looking to gather data and be educated, all the back & forthing to see, gather, understand, and prioritize the information can be just maddening.

 

[Eightarmedpet]

I can't see how you're an edge case.

There's a reason why chicken, pork, and beef aren't packaged in virtually-alike containers so that shoppers could choose by price first, then play the memory/whack-a-mole game iterating to locate what they want, spending more time now than was required before when things were rather refined and just right, with little to nothing broken and in need of major revamping.

I'm actually agreeing with you here, re read what I wrote.

Reg being broken - you have no idea about the tech dept of that page which might have been part of the push for a new design and build, but neither do I, I'm just speculating...

Claiming Apples home page is unbearable is laughable, I think you might just have to accept that not everyone in the world fell in love with UI design in the early 2000's and has decided it should never change. For most people sites of that era are cramped and over loaded with information, which becomes a barrier, there is a reason more and more people shop online these days one of which is we've learned not every pixel has a £ value (unlike in print) and to cut down on information overload to show just whats needed, although I can't disagree that concept can be taken too far at times (refurb page prime example).

 

[Tozovac]

Can anyone give a reason besides “stylistic choice” (or peer pressure) why light/medium blue and grey flat design is still the go-to “best in class” uIX theme? When was it decided that this is the best?

Our SAP portal at work was redesigned towards very flat and very light blue/white/gray, where I’m continually thinking greyed-out flat-looking options are intended to be “not available,” yet they’re to be “actionable.” The new and improved and flattened interface is not better (is worse in some instances) but is just now different.

Seriously. When and where was this aesthetic published in a design journal to be Best In Class, with objective rationale and justifications. Or is this just the web/app/developer world continuing to lemmingly follow Apple circa 2013 who lemmingly gave in to following a mashup of Windows Phone OS, Microsoft Metro, and Google/Android Material Design, all of which I contend where half-baked attempts at a uIX to be similar to but safely different enough to Apple’s then best in class uIX around 2012 and prior?

Anyone?

 

[040]

Can anyone give a reason besides “stylistic choice” (or peer pressure) why light/medium blue and grey flat design is still the go-to “best in class” uIX theme? When was it decided that this is the best?

Our SAP portal at work was redesigned towards very flat and very light blue/white/gray, where I’m continually thinking greyed-out flat-looking options are intended to be “not available,” yet they’re to be “actionable.” The new and improved and flattened interface is not better (is worse in some instances) but is just now different.

Seriously. When and where was this aesthetic published in a design journal to be Best In Class, with objective rationale and justifications. Or is this just the web/app/developer world continuing to lemmingly follow Apple circa 2013 who lemmingly gave in to following a mashup of Windows Phone OS, Microsoft Metro, and Google/Android Material Design, all of which I contend where half-baked attempts at a uIX to be similar to but safely different enough to Apple’s then best in class uIX around 2012 and prior?

Anyone?

I don't know dude. Just dropping by to say that i'm still with ya on this one. It baffles me that it's not getting any better. We're still not moving in the right direction with more detailed surfaces, (subtle) drop shadows, web design that makes good use of desktop screen real-estate, etc. Apple and Google are directly to blame for this. I've been on Android for a couple of years by now and i'm seeing Google do stuff with their apps (web too) that really makes me scratch my eyes out. All white surfaces, getting rid of contrast and color..

Meanwhile, dumb designer talk like this still prevails everywhere:
https://spotify.design/articles/2018-11-28/redesigning-the-spotify-icon-suite/

The old icons were too complex and the visual metaphors were difficult for users to understand — which presented challenges when used in different sizes for all of our products. Meanwhile, the new simple shapes made it easier for us to implement icons that responded to any range of sizes, screens, and use cases.

Bold markup by me. This is how lazy design teams have become. It's way easier FOR THEM to just adhere to the flat/thin/minimal trend than to really differentiate themselves with unique styling.

On a more positive note, this might be of interest to you:

The author, Bob Burrough, is a former Apple employee that has recently been critical of Apple. He gets it. Bring back some fun in UI design!

 

[Tozovac]

@040

Good God. Thanks for those links.

First I eye-rolled and gagged at least 20 times reading the Spotify article. A classic case of the problem at hand: Designers designing to imagined and unnecessary needs, partly or in whole to make their job more interesting for the week.

Secondly, I googled Bob Burrough and read up a bit on his tweets and other news bits about him. I immediately thought he’s been pirating and copying what I’ve complained about the moment I downgraded to ios7!!! J/k. But seriously, he GETS IT. This tweet is 100% in agreement with what I’ve felt about web/app/OS design since 2013:

https://www.researchgate.net/public...itional_Design_Comparative_Experimental_Study


“In the past few years flat user interface design has become the predominating visual style of operating systems, websites and mobile apps. Although flat design has been widely criticized by HCI and usability experts, empirical research on flat design is still scarce. We present the results of an experimental comparative study of visual search effectiveness on traditional and flat designs. The following types of visual search tasks were examined: (1) search for a target word in text; (2) search for a target icon in a matrix of icons; (3) search for clickable objects on webpages. Time and accuracy parameters of the visual search, as well as oculomotor activity, were measured. The results show that a search in flat text mode (compared with the traditional mode) is associated with higher cognitive load. A search for flat icons takes twice as long as for realistic icons and is also characterized by higher cognitive load. Identifying clickable objects on flat web pages requires more time and is characterised by a significantly greater number of errors. Our results suggest replacing the flat style user interfaces with interfaces based on the design principles developed over decades of research and practice of HCI and usability engineering.”

An official paper to explain what many of us knew for 5 years now, and had already been discussed by others less academically and more creatively:

http://cheerfulsw.com/2015/destroying-apples-legacy/

Of course, this doesn’t cover other facets of today’s poor design practices, such as super-low-contrast text on stark white backgrounds, hiding functions buried underneath hamburger/gear/ellipses icons or unknowingly off-screen elsewhere due to some misguided rationale of being less cluttered and “distracting,” using a mobile-first scroll-heavy mindset with so much wasted space you need 3-4 swipes to even gain context of what’s presented on a particular page load, but it’s fun to see!

 

[smirking]

Bold markup by me. This is how lazy design teams have become. It's way easier FOR THEM to just adhere to the flat/thin/minimal trend than to really differentiate themselves with unique styling.

I don't think that's an example of laziness so much as an example of choosing the least bad option. If you really consider what he said before he cheerfully trotted out their imperfect design solution, you can understand why they went down this road. They wanted to have a single icon set that they can use on any device from the tiny screen of an Apple Watch to a full blown 5K display. The tiny smartwatch screen is where life goes from being merely difficult to impossible if you're seeking to maintain a single unified look and feel across all of your UIs. They're being constrained by their worst case scenario.

That said, I really hate that new Spotify look. I'm in the odd position of thinking they made a wise decision on the engineering end but at best a disappointing one in the UI/UX department.
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Can anyone give a reason besides “stylistic choice” (or peer pressure) why light/medium blue and grey flat design is still the go-to “best in class” uIX theme? When was it decided that this is the best?

Our SAP portal at work was redesigned towards very flat and very light blue/white/gray...

I had to reinstall Windows 10 for someone right around the time I read this. Guess what I spent my day looking at? Yup, lots of super flat light blue and grey with sans serif fonts and maybe that explains why your despised colorway is so prevalent. It's what Windows 10 uses.

I can't answer for SAP or your SAP consultants, but perhaps they just went with the colorway that was right in front of them at the time they were building the system.

Going back even further, blue-grey-white has been around forever. I still have an older Windows NT machine that throws out plenty of blue-grey-white screens. Granted those are easier to read since they haven't yet switched to sans serif fonts. Anyway, I don't think blue-grey-white is a new idea.