I think we designers are getting what we deserve based on our stupid pseudo-intellectual behavior of the last years.
Starting with the Bauhaus, designers around the world started to claim that design has nothing to do with art, self-expression and beauty for the sake of beauty (or _decoration_, which they call it). We tried to convince the world that design is a pseudo-scientific discipline which tries to solve communication problems in effective ways, which can only happen by the means of methodic procedures overlooked by experienced designers.
Bullshit. We got very good at bullshit. The biggest design shops in the world charge millions for design manuals full of bullshit that tries to justify ugly designs. Just look at the GAP redesign.
We got what we deserved because guess what: machines, data-driven procedures and crowdsourcing communities are better at the whole communication problems in effective ways thing, minus the bullshit.
What we need to do is return to make things beautiful. Beauty is still important for the world. Data-driven design can only to produce things that are good-enough/above-the-average. Like the auto-generated songs and novels of 1984, they can create blandness or even pop, but not beautiful subversive punk.
And let the bullshit design justifiers die a slow painful death.
What we understand as "beautiful" is based in cultural traditions. In America, women want to appear tanned, and will use any variety of chemicals to achieve a darker complexion. In the Philippines, they want to appear pale, and will use any manner of chemicals to achieve a lighter complexion. It's not enough to say, "make it beautiful", you have to understand on a fundamental level (and you don't understand something on a fundamental level if you can't articulate it) what that beauty means for your consumers.
Except that they don't, I can't think of a single thing that has truly universal appeal, consider apple's market share when you're making the claim that they do. I even use a fair few of their products and don't find them "beautiful" by any stretch of the imagination, merely kinda sort functional.
Starting with the Bauhaus, designers around the world started to claim that design has nothing to do with art, self-expression and beauty for the sake of beauty (or _decoration_, which they call it). We tried to convince the world that design is a pseudo-scientific discipline which tries to solve communication problems in effective ways, which can only happen by the means of methodic procedures overlooked by experienced designers.
Bullshit. We got very good at bullshit. The biggest design shops in the world charge millions for design manuals full of bullshit that tries to justify ugly designs. Just look at the GAP redesign.
We got what we deserved because guess what: machines, data-driven procedures and crowdsourcing communities are better at the whole communication problems in effective ways thing, minus the bullshit.
What we need to do is return to make things beautiful. Beauty is still important for the world. Data-driven design can only to produce things that are good-enough/above-the-average. Like the auto-generated songs and novels of 1984, they can create blandness or even pop, but not beautiful subversive punk.
And let the bullshit design justifiers die a slow painful death.