September 28th, 2005
Turning the corner: Designing for Web 2.0
I’ve been thinking about this for a while now. What will it mean to design in this industry in the coming years, and how will we, as designers, have to adapt in order to get the most out of it?
But before I talk about that, I’d like to talk about design. What is it? More importantly what has it become? And how will it be in the future?
So, What is it? A brief history.
For many years now, design has been viewed as being aesthetic. Design equals How Something Looks. You see this attitude to design in every part of society — clothing design to interior design, less so in product design, and yes, in web design.
Years ago, when I was a lad.… No, seriously. Years ago, when the web first went mainstream we saw designers move to it from a number of industries — architecture, print design and multimedia (cd-rom and kiosk) design. They all brought with them a way of working which was almost exclusively associated with the aesthetic. Designing nice looking stuff for the web.
Then along came the people from HCI backgrounds and the social sciences and said ‘Hang on a minute, whilst these website’s look nice, they aren’t very usable’, and so was born the whole usability thing.
At about the same time, businesses realised that their sites were becoming a bit of a mess. So, they asked some people from library sciences to come along and join the party and Information Architecture was born.
So, we had Designers making things look nice, Usability experts arguing with the Designers about links must be blue and Information Architects sitting quietly making lists.
Thankfully that is, mostly, in the past.
What has it become?
After that splintering of the design profession (I’ll come back to this), we ended up with a faceted industry. By that I mean, lot’s of highly specialised fields. At the time of the big crash, the industry could not sustain so many experts and we had to multi-task. all of a sudden if you wanted to get by the web you had to know PHP, Javascipt, IA, Flash, be a cracking designer as well as a first rate Information Architect. Oh, and you had to be pretty good at making tea too.
That was still the case up until a few months ago. And I guess this is the whole point to this post. We are on the cusp of something here. I can smell it.
How will it be in the future?
Web 2.0 is all the thing at the moment. Silly, silly name if you ask me. And no, I’m not going to explain it because I don’t really know myself. I think Web 2.0 represents a change, that’s all. Not only a change in the way the internet works, and is driven, and interacted with, but a change in the industry itself.
I believe there will be a return to design no longer being associated with just the asthetic. If you’ve read this site before, you probably know what I think about design. I think design covers so much more than the aesthetic. Design is fundamentally more. Design is usability. It is Information Architecture. It is Accessibility. This is all design.
A few years ago, when there were silly job titles around, designer’s also fell into that trap of trying to differenciate themselves from ‘those designers who just make things look nice’. We had ‘User Experience Designer’, ‘Usability Designer’, ‘VP of UI’ — you know, silly things like that. Now, I call myself a ‘Designer ‘- plain and simple — and thankfully I’m beginning to think the industry, clients included, are beginning to understand what I’m talking about.
Designers in the coming years, I feel, will have to embrace aspects of design that have long been pushed aside by the, rather bullish, aesthetic. We need to embrace problem solving, not just visual problems either. We need to embrace the history of design — the craft of design — in order to understand the rules behind the aesthtic stuff we’ve been doing all these years. When we do, we’ll find that these rules have been based on solving problems — not on how things look, but how they work.
Designing for Web 2.0 will not be about technology for designers. No? No, it will be about people. It will be about designing stuff that people use and all that goes along with it. It will be simpler, better and more rewarding for designers but only if we let go of the aesthetic and grab hold of the other stuff.
Ok. Don’t say I didn’t warn you …
I know what you mean. I’ve avoided scripting languages for years, preferring to concentrate on just being a graphic designer.
Well, I’m having to put my Javascripthat back on, and maybe a Ruby hat too, now that I’m starting a major “Web 2.0” project. Maybe it’s because the project is a personal one that I don’t mind expanding my skills. If a client asked me to make an Ajax application, I’d still tell him to hire a programmer.
“Design is usability. It is Information Architecture. It is Accessibility. This is all design”…
“We need to embrace problem solving, not just visual problems either. We need to embrace the history of design — the craft of design — in order to understand the rules behind the aesthtic stuff we’ve been doing all these years. When we do, we’ll find that these rules have been based on solving problems — not on how things look, but how they work.”
100% Correct. Design, traditionally — before it became aesthetics, is associated with solving problems. Even interior designers do this (see Joel Spolksy’s office, everyone gets 2 windows! even the cubes). On the web there are lots of problems. A while back updating content vs updating appearance, hence semantic HTML and CSS. After that, people don’t even know what their looking at or how to use it, hence usability and IA. Now, applications are not responsive, hence XMLHTTPRequest. Next, managing all of that and streamlining it easily so it doesn’t break every time we change something! Oh yea, and mobile too… (the mobile series has been very informative over at Authentic Boredom)
Thoroughly enjoyed reading your article. I wholeheartedly agree with “Design is usability. It is Information Architecture. It is Accessibility.”
I absolutely agree with Paul D… I have severe doubts that there will be a full merge between webdesigners and web developers.
Simply because there are the people with programming skills, and then there are those with the aestethic skills. But on the other side — I agree with you in the sense that it would be great to force back the programming side of it all.
I have been missing the good’ol programming.. (But still — I havn’t learned my good PHP…)
Paul and J?rgen — I think you’re misunderstanding me a bit there.
I’m not talking about the merging of designers and developers at all. What I am talking about is design returning to what it is fundamentally about.
I guess what I’m talking about is web design is going to mature and align with traditional design values.
Apologies if I didn’t make myself clear — it waas a bit of a rant.
As a developer and not by any means a designer, I agree with the points about people having to multi-task but to echo Paul D, if you want AJAX you get a developer and if you want CSS you get a designer.
The ‘new’ web pretty much demands both of these aspects and I think we will start to see the two types of people working much closer to be able to achieve the types of applications that are typical of ‘Web 2.0’.
I can writeHTML, even know a little CSS but that doesn’t mean that I can develop from back-end to client-side something of the standard of Flickr — although I might be able to manage producing a UI something like del.icio.us… ;)
I think you need a good mix of both groups, and get them to work together so that some good overlap can start to happen, which can only enable further learning and collaboration.
I did say that was the case. I don’t recall saying that designers will have to become developers and visa-versa. I was talking about designers designing not just making things look nice (and all that goes with that).
What I did say was that a while ago you would see adverts for ‘jack of all trades’, but thankfully it appears those times are behind us.
Just to clear up any misunderstanding. I’m not saying Developers need to be Designers or Designers need to be Developers and the two will combine into some uber-web-employee. That’s not what I was saying.
It’s ok Mark, I understood what you were getting at ;)
In fact, just today I was having an in depth discussion with a client regarding design. I was trying to impress upon him that when I say “design”, I’m not just referring to a pretty header, but I mean smart navigation, intuitive layout, and other general usability concerns.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think what you’re really getting at is we’re now past the stage where websites just had to be pretty…now they really need to perform. I couldn’t agree more.
I agree with you as well Mark, I was trying to add that more partnerships will be created in the future as designers and developers realise that you need both types of people to be able to offer the types of websites & webservices that are being demanded these days.
Form over function? I now thing these two are going to be going head-to-head from now on…
I agree with everything you’re saying Mark, but find it quite strange that, for the most part, you’re using the future tense.
This whole change in focus from just making websites pretty, to considering how they perform from the user’s point of view (encompassing, as you said, accessibility, usability, and so forth), has been going on for some time, and the majority of people with whom I work are already reasonably clued-up about the things being discussed here.
From my perspective at least, “Web 2.0”, as you define it here, isn’t something that will happen, it’s something that has happened, and is happening.
Stephen,
I think one thing you have to consider is that the kinds of designers who frequent design blogs, and care about things like accessibility and usability are still very much in the minority.
Yes, there has been a huge movement in recent years, but these considerations are not shared by the vast majority of designers/developers today.
Try hiring someone out of school who’s even heard of usability, for example. We’re getting there, but as of today, it’s only the elite (like yourself ;)) who even know about a “web 2.0”.
I’ve always been a designer.
I’ve never been a graphic designer.
It’s long past time we rescued the generic from the specific.
Engineers are designers, as are civic planners and chefs.
Cheers Adam, never been one of the elite before. Nice view ;)
Your point about what’s being taught in schools (and presumably colleges) is an interesting one, and something that I’ve seen bemoaned in the past; students still being tutored in the ways of the table-layout, and other such horrors.
Taking Mark’s original statement about the differing backgrounds of those who have ended up working in this field, I wonder how things will change (if at all) now that there are people entering the industry who have only ever done web design — will they have the breadth of knowledge regarding human interaction that, say, a product designer or an architect has?
Stephen
Apparently, Jakob Nielsen is responsible for the decline in what he calls the “glamour design agency” . Not that he’s biased or anything. :-P
In any case, it would seem to indicate that this particular aspect of “Web 2.0” is reasonably well established.
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20030929.html
Coool !!!
Sorry for any confusion I may have contributed to. :)
I still think that the Web 2.0 will come about largely as a result of “graphic designers” becoming multi-talented designers, with scripting and other skills under their belts.
I think that talented visual designers might be in a better position to see how good design and usability planning will lead to powerful Ajax applications. “Graphic” designers have always been worried about how their nice web designs would work out once the functionality was added, but the programmers who ended up implementing them typically did not take usability into consideration. (This is my experience, forgive me if I’m misrepresenting things.)
This is not to disparage programmers, but they live in a world of complex, powerful languages and programming tools. They’re technical people used to steep learning curves. It’s difficult for them to see things in a simple fashion like a user. I’m sure there will be the odd exceptional programmer (perhaps some of the comment posters on this page) who takes a leading roll in the new Web, but so far, most of the movers seem to be multi-disciplinary individuals like Shaun Inman and design shops like 37signals.
I’ve not been a designer for years.
I tend to go by Visual Communicater, seems to cover a lot more in it’s description of what I do — day to day.
“What I did say was that a while ago you would see adverts for ?jack of all trades?, but thankfully it appears those times are behind us.” — Mark Boulton
Sigh…if only that were true. I’m signed up to a job listing that sends me emails on a daily basis advertising positions for Web Designers requiring expert knowledge of: <insert the usual design packages here> plus HTML, XHTML, CSS, XML, PHP, Perl, Java, Actionscript, AA, RAC, BT, Blah, Blah, Blah…
Surely these folk must realise is what they’ll end up with is a ‘Jack of all trades…master of none’
I don’t think anyone here mentioned it:
The bathing ape has no clothes
Adam Greenfield on designer vs. stylist, from a while back. No timestamp, and I can’t remember when I first saw it, but a while ago… overlaps your piece here a bit.
So true. Effective designers understand the constraints of their medium. You don’t have to be a developer but it would be extremely beneficial to understand its principals of reuse and modularity. I wrote a short blurb about a response from a designer over a conference call regarding HTML… I’m interested to hear what you and your readers think…
I’m a Designer not a Coder!- PS don’t worry it is relevant. No shameless plug.
Mark, completely agree with moving away from purely aesthetical design (that’s one of the reasons I read you blog) — however:
It seems to be a trend to focus solely on Web 2.0/Web applications as being the future/saviour of digital design.
There will always be a parallel arena for marketing/integrated digital campaigns that aren’t application based, that also need “designers” to develop solutions to these problems in a intelligent, clear and unique way.
These are probably seen as more ‘aesthetic’ in terms of their slickness — although in no way should they be any more devoid of a generative concept — but they should also not be disregarded as not worthy.
Perhaps its my age or experience, but personally I believe any Visual Communicators/Designers should be able to turn their hand to anything that is asked of them, be it Web 2.0, marcomms or any niche market defined by the target audience coupled with the answer to the problem.
Design is fundamentally about solving problems, but it must also stimulate, excite and engage its intended audience.
Very good article, Mark.
I agree that design is about so much more than the aesthetic. A dictionary definition of design is this -
which is a usable one. It emphasises the process of thinking that is requires to design well.
btw on the subject of job titles, can I have “Senior Vice-President of coloring-in” ?
I reckon the art of web design is finally maturing. It has to, because more is being required of todays websites, and the resultant complexity is much higher that before.
Its readily apparent that in systems of enterprise complexity you definitely need people fulfilling the role of architect, system designer, database designer, web designer, web developer, graphical artist and usability expert not to mention all the non-technical roles.
The different technical roles definitely require different skills and some people can cover more than one role. An information architect is not the same as a web designer — one requires data modelling skills and the other needs to know the mechanics of web pages. You could have a generic designer covering both skills, but essentially two roles are being fulfilled, they are not really the same role. You could have a designer who is skilled in all the different types of design, but its a lot to know, and you may need several designers anyway just to cope with the design workload.
What I’m trying to rant towards here is that because Web 2.0 will be about more complex, more effective websites. Therefore the situation will move towards that needed to produce enterprise class websites which by their nature have to be very usable and are very complex and hence the skills and roles will be more similar for websites.
Personally, I believe that all roles should consider that usable functionality is the primary aim of any website, and therefore it should influence every aspect of a websites design and implementation.
I think I’m agreeing with the author of this article, but I’m coming from the perspective of someone who was a web designer once but shifted to enterprise systems design and fully appreciates the different skillsets. I shudder to think of how little I considered fundamental system design concerns when I was a web desinger, but I can see how I got away with it as the level of complexity was low enough to ignore most of them, and fudge the rest without any real understanding.
Phew.. glad I got to the end of this rant…
Mark,
I have come into web design from an IT background. I started doing web pages because I understood how it all worked, not because I could make pretty sites. For me one of the exciting things about building web sites is the variety. I get to do HTML, CSS, SQL, ASP & Javascriptat the moment. I get to do some interesting programming whilst having the satisfaction of having something nice to look at as a finished product.