I write a bit about design (especially graphic design) and my readers are mainly graphic designers. A few years ago I realized that this was stupid: the people who knew me weren't the people who would give me work. I would be much better off writing for a business audience. I would do more good and make more money.

Gerry McGovern convinced me that I was wrong (well, McGovern and a bunch of other biz writers) or at least that I'd be bad at being a management guru. I realized that successful business writers did what politicians call "keeping on message." (Think of the first few years of the Bush administration. The answer to every question was that the problem--any problem--could be solved by lowering taxes.) I realized that I wouldn't be very good at that. Jacob Nielsen, Gerry McGovern, and various other gurus have important things to say about design but they are so busy giving their stock answer that they don't ever stop to listen to the question. They remind me of the guy who used to say "Jesus loves you" over and over in Sproul Plaza in Berkeley nearly four decades ago. He was eloquently described by a local Hells Angel: "The fucker must have swallowed a parrot." 

The newsletter tells us that "[t]he Web is a functional, practical place. . . The shiny surface wins awards. Real substance wins customers."

Yes and no. Some of the web is a functional, practical place and sometimes a shiny surface wins customers. McGovern's parrot says "information retrieval." A few years ago he was listing bad websites and used the site of a popular vodka brand as an example of a site where it was impossible to find information. I asked what important information he wanted to find about colorless, tasteless alcohol and, of course, he had no answer. In that particular case, the website was all about letting young males play around in a "branded environment" (an obnoxious phrase but I can't think of a better terse description), resulting, the company hoped, in some degree of brand loyalty.

Let's give McGovern and Nielsen and the like the benefit of the doubt and say that their words are aimed at a particular part of the business web world so when they say "The web is x" they mean "Your website and its ilk are x." So no harm, no foul. Their advice is sound for those being advised, right?

First, is the advice helpful for its target? Does anyone believe that businesses sit around and declare that they want to make their websites into unusable eye candy, that they want obnoxious Flash movies and hate the idea of someone being able to find anything on their websites? They only need to be convinced to give up their over-aesthetized ways? The problem is that they are not thinking clearly about their goals. The sort of advice in the newsletter does little to solve that problem. If someone cooks overly-spiced food that is nutritionally dismal, screaming about the evils of chili powder will not cause them to embrace a healthy diet. Making people associate "good" food with boring food does not promote the goal of healthy eating.

McGovern's dismissals give the impression that any aesthetic impulse is that enemy of usability and that usability in the narrowest sense of the term is always not just important but the only important factor. That's about one step away from Nielsen's call for the end of web design. 

No, Ken, McGovern does not seem to claim that awards are irrelevant (even though that dismissal seems amazingly broad; if only a few things are categorically "relevant" then -most- things are irrelevant.) He seems to make the case that awards are signifiers of a problem. His David Ogilvy quote about being "disgraced by an award" sets the tone.

Let me be clear. I am not defending design awards as being important or meaningful. My work has won over a hundred of them and the part that I would call my most worthwhile or important work is not as well represented in the annuals as work that I would consider secondary. There are many problems with the selection of design awards and many problems with the very notion of design awards. And there are designers who think more about awards or the opinions of their peers than the needs of their clients and the needs of their clients' customers. But imagine McGovern's argument applied to, say, doctoral degrees in design or design research. 

Ken and I have both argued vigorously against anti intellectualism and particularly when it has been used to dismiss design academics. But is there anyone on this list who has not seen design writing that was of no relevance to design and designers? How about design research that seemed to have more to do with publishing, promotion, and tenure than with real design issues?

The stupid response to such work would be to impugn intellectualism, taking an "I know about the real world" stance. A more worthwhile approach is noting that the work in question is weak and shouldn't be encouraged while defending worthy academic pursuits. The rhetoric  of McGovern, et al, is as dismissive to aesthetic concerns as the "real world" crowd is to academia. If we listen to both groups, ugly and stupid will be the measure of success.

Gunnar


ps: Anyone who thinks that "a white block with rounded corners" adequately describes the aesthetics of the iPod should be ignored. I can't help Keith's students on his challenge, however; I'm still trying to figure out if "justifying the iPod" means making sure the type is aligned on both sides. What, specifically, requires justification?

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