The state of modern web design is a thing that I look upon with disgust.
It is actually baffling to me how few the amount of people that share this
opinion is, but put simply, modern web design and the ideology that surro-
unds it is awful.
The way that I design websites -- the way that I designed the website y-
ou are most likely reading this on right now -- have a very clear vision
to be as simple and easy to navigate as possible. No un-needed trackers,
no un-needed cookies, no un-needed scripts. No fat. Content and readabili-
ty first, everything else second.
This vision for web-design, or lack thereof, is what I think is wrong
with the modern web.
It appears to me that a lot of web designers these days are in it to put
some pretty pictures on a screen and get money from advertisers. They see
the word 'design' in the title of 'web-designer' and think of of a graphi-
cal designer instead of what they should be thinking of, an architectural
designer. Your job should be to make sure that everything is as readable
and easy-to-find as possible. A good web designer does not make his job
known. Good web design should be as invisible as possible.
Perhaps a client will ask for things that sacrifice your vision of simp-
licity. Perhaps you should put your foot down and tell the client that so-
mething is a bad idea.
A good web designer should make a website as easy to navigate as possib-
le. A great web designer can have a good looking website, with no cost to
the core vision.
The issue of teaching web design in a school setting follows closely wi-
th the issue discussed in the previous section. A lot of people hired for
teaching positions in web design lack the K.I.S.S* ideology that is oh-so-
-important for creating a good website.
*Keep It Simple, Stupid!
The web design teacher of the modern day, while not actively malicious,
fails to mention the idea that web design should be kept as simple as pos-
sible.
This is not the worst thing that they could be doing (as they could be
actively teaching against keeping things simple), but it is still not good
to fail to mention something so crucial to students.
Another large problem with the entire education system as a whole, is th-
at for some students, the environment of having a teacher tell you what to
do with the threat of bad grades, and by extension an unsuccessful life is
not very conducive to learning and stifles both creativity and morale.
While web design (and usage of a computer as a whole) is fun to experime-
nt and play around with, the wrong environment can completely spoil a stud-
ent's opinion of things. Students should receive guidance to get them going
at first, but then I think they should just be left to their own devices
and revel in the joy of creation.
A more broad solution is to just offer more choice and more freedom for
students to find what works best for them, as having a teacher breathe down
their neck truly does work better for some, and should not be taken away c-
ompletely if it really does help some learn.
Modern web design should be kept simple and effective. Functionality sho-
uld always come before aesthetics or monetary gain.
The education system should offer more choice to students to create an e-
nvironment more conducive to learning and creativity.
- Octavio "qms" Maury, March 17, 2022