ARTICLE NO. 30    February 08, 2006

Hungry? Want another bullshit sandwich?

by

There has been too much nonsense spouted about the effectiveness of certain successful companies’ websites and it’s time to correct it. Those who say that poorly designed websites are partly responsible for some companies’ success are feeding you a load of crap. And too many of you are eating it up.

Stop it. Bad design harms business, it does not help it. Websites like Boingboing, Google and eBay are successful in spite of their poorly designed sites, not because of them. What kills me is that I continue to see designers, some of them professionals, buying into this drivel and helping to perpetuate it. This whole business of contemplating the elusive wisdom of bad design and ugly layout is amateur hour on parade. It’s time to call bullshit.

This is commercial success we’re talking about, boys and girls. In commerce, if your product sucks, you suck.

Commercial success plus bad design does NOT equal good design. The reason Google is the premier search tool is because it works. It is the most comprehensive and best-respected search tool for most Web users. It’s well managed, a business leader rather than follower and it has been around for quite a while. Google is a mover and shaker, constantly finding and providing tools, solutions and applications for everyday people to use online. The Google brand has gravity, respect and delivers tangible results every minute of the day. THAT’S why Google is the search engine of choice.

The fact that Google’s website is unremarkable and poorly laid out is ancillary to these facts, mostly because the main interface is very simple. Poorly designed “simple” is far easier to swallow than poorly designed “complex”. It works okay in spite of the bad layout and un-design.The fact is Google got it right where so many fail. They built their reputation on substance rather than on style. They’re not important because of their style, but because of execution. They don’t have to look important because they simply are important.

This is commercial success we’re talking about, boys and girls. In commerce, if your product sucks, you suck.

Most companies put the cart before the horse and try to build their success on how cool their company culture is or how awesomely awesome their logo is. Google’s logo pretty much sucks. So what? They can buy and sell any company that has a cool logo any day of the week; not because of their awful main interface layout, but in spite of it.

All of these companies that have suckass website designs and layouts but are successful anyway did the same thing. eBay was best at what it does before anyone else was that good. They’ve locked up the category with execution first, not style. Boingboing is one of the best-known and most popular weblogs because everybody loves to go there to hate on the Bush administration. The design sucks, but the content and advertising always bashes the readers’ #1 enemy. Substance, not style.

This is commercial success we’re talking about, boys and girls. In commerce, if your product sucks, you suck. It won’t matter how awesome your website looks, you will fail if your product is not up to snuff. By the same token, you are allowed to look like a dog if your product is the cat’s meow. Think about it; the successful businessperson will always have a hot date to the dinner party. We’re talking about human behavior here, folks.

But let’s not be too smart by half. Craigslist, for instance, is a clear winner with an un-design, but it’s not an example of bad design. The site content is nothing but relevant text links, and rightly so! The “design” it uses is well-suited to the type of content, so it is quite effective. This site is not like eBay or Google, as it succeeds because of the design rather than spite of it. Google and eBay have layout components and content that were clearly added as afterthoughts, ruining any true layout or design. Not so with Craigslist, the layout is solid and design appropriate. Design is a solution to a problem, not a decoration or embellishment.

So we should stop swallowing tripe for cream. As designers, it’s time for some of us to see that the emperor has no clothes and to use our insight, understanding and training to define what we agree with rather than mindlessly going along with idiots in the crowd. We have a responsibility to avoid pseudoscience and pseudointellectualism as it relates to what we produce for our clients and what we share with our fellow designers. If we’ve not got a sufficient grasp of things to see through this sort of drivel, perhaps we should go back to school or find another line of work.

Bottom line is designers need a foundation to ward off ridiculous ideas like “bad design creates success”. We shouldn’t relegate ourselves to simply sailing whichever way the wind is blowing this week. When the wind smells bad, it’s time to get upwind of the bullshit.

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February 10, 2006
“Boingboing is one of the best-known and most popular weblogs because everybody loves to go there to hate on the Bush administration.”

This is a laugher. You and I must get routed to a different boingboing.net. I’d say 1-in-50 posts even mentions Bush. And only 1 ad is anti-Bush related. In fact, using the Google engine on BoingBoing you only get a couple hundred posts on GWB, approx 25/year. That’s one post every two weeks. Bashing Bush has absolutely NOTHING to do with BoingBoing’s success.

Your analysis is more “suckass” than these design problems.
February 10, 2006
I wonder how many people criticizing this article are in fact bad designers themselves. We can all agree to disagree when it comes to the sites Andy has chosen to illustrate his point with but when I search the internet and come across “web design companies” that are creating bad MS Front Page site after site, it lends to his arguement. Many companies that we designers are designing for don’t have any clue what good design is, as witnessed by so many poorly designed company web sites. I say stop picking on his choice of language, sites he used to illustrate his point and start learning the art of design.
February 10, 2006
Andy, you are a young, bright web designer who is passionate about your craft-Good for you! Your writing style does need work. You should not use words such as suckass and shit sandwich when discussing design of highly successful sites.

You are basically bringing up large corporate sites that have a long history (for the web) and are successful. Your rant seems more like talk from a frustrated web designer. You should try to work for one of these sites and see what really goes on behind the scenes. Much of what you see on screen is not the work solely of web designers employing the latest fades, gradients and CSS. The design is a result of a long iterative process where people on various levels have input on the final design.

Many think eBay’s designs are not up to par, but I disagree. eBay works because you don’t really have to explain to anyone how to use it. The information and links are easy to see. It may not be the most aesthetically pleasing, but it helps get the job done.

Google and other sites work on the same prinicpal. As a result, I would say that these sites actually employ good design. Not every site has to have the ubiquitous fades, bright colors, 3d logos and such that are the current style. They are making their own brand and sticking with it.

In the discussion there are many examples of other version of Google, but I really do not see how much “better” these designs are compared to the original Google site.
The design at:
http://www.andyrutledge.com/google-redux.php

Looks more like Microsoft’s search site. That design would be more detrimental to Google since it would dilute their brand. Plus, it uses blue which during the high flying 90s was more of a cliche. “I’d like a website with a rotating logo and make sure it is blue”
February 10, 2006
Could you whine a little more? I read very little that offered any help whatsoever.
February 10, 2006
Though sometimes “over designing” can kill a good tool by accident. I agree bad design is not good for anything.
February 10, 2006
I’m not sure how some people can consider eBay a good interface design. I think the article nails the fact that it succeeds despite it’s design—just as Word succeeds as a DTP program despite its user-combative nature. Word is a powerful, useful product and used by a huge user base; but it is also extremely difficult to use where it should be simple in some regards. Same goes for eBay.

But every time I’ve tried to use eBay, I am so frustrated by bad search results (so many unqualified hits) and the effort it takes to filter it down, that I swear I’ll never come back. It is the 800-pound gorilla that no one can take on. Even if another online auction product came online that was designed well, it would never succeed because of the community already built up within eBay. Would you rather have hundreds of thousands of potential bidders able to see your product or a few hundred? The former. But that’s not to say that eBay couldn’t make their site easier to use. Until they do, I probably won’t ever buy or sell off it again (especially since most items are sold by online quasi-stores instead of individual sellers and it’s hard to tell the difference—but that’s a different issue).
February 10, 2006
There is a reason the Google home page (for example) is like that is because it works. Google gets so many visitors a day that they can try placement of something for a couple of hours and quickly know whether the element works or not.
Everything they do is based on how the element adds to whatever they decide is the goal of the page.

Nice design would be, well, nice – but it doesn’t neccesarily mean that it’s succesful.

The same goes for eBay and Amazon. The Amazon site looks fairly nasty, but I’m sure it’s completely optimized for the conversion goals they set.
February 10, 2006
Oooh, look, let’s add blue bars at the top and bottom. Then let’s move sign in link from one of THE standard locations it is found on pages all over the web.

I call bullshit. The redo is essentially the same as Google’s current site, minus some pizzazz.
February 10, 2006
Nice one. I have to say I agree.

Along the same lines, I did a theoretical redesign of Friendster… and oddly enough, when they relaunched, they’d incorporated a lot of the same stuff I’d been thinking about.

So these kinds of critiques do matter, and they do help. I do think Google is doing more to address usability / UI issues…we’ll just have to wait and see.
February 10, 2006
Good design, good design, good design … only graphic designers need good design because when they see something they consider ugly, they suffer. But beautiful graphics are not an interesting status symbol anymore for corporations. Especially on the web. On the web things that look familiary made are more likely to succeed.

Despite of the technical functionality and the basic usability, Ebay looks like a bargain place and Google looks easy and simple.

Both are lies, Ebay is not a bargain place and Google is not easy and simple. So, goal of design accomplished!
February 11, 2006
Regarding the “redesign” of the Google interface, it seems fairly obvious that some level of interface design would be in order. However, I find the pronciples of the redesign flawed.

I think that we all agree that when redesigning a brand you have keep loyal to the principles and core-values of the brand. The front page of Google seems to be by far the most visible aspect of the brand. So extra care should be taken to maintain the principles behind the look and feel of the site.

On the usability side, Google has been, trough it’s history, a very tool-like, hence easy-to-use, site. No unnecessary flourishes or clutter, straight-to-the-point, the Google-logo being the only more flashy element in the page, bringing the brand and a more “personal” touch to the service. The simplicity of the site could be one of the reasons of it´s success: it’s like a blank page providing you the possibilities to access the information that you want, not trying to push it´s brand too much in your face and thus distancing people who already see too much ads in their surroundings.

This design might be unintencional, brought on by the lack of able designers at the time of launching the site, or for other reasons. The reason for the design doesn´t matter, at the present day the visual feel of the site is a very strong part of the brand image of google. So very special care should be taken in modifying the page – which is exactly what Google is doing.

I’d argue that the basics of the design of the site are very sound. Problems seem to arise from the new content that has been necessary to incorporate in the design as the site has been growing. I surmise that that has been the idea behind the redesign also.

In the redesign, I’d stress the following:

1) maintain the tool like, very simple aesthetic. Refrain from adding a range of “translucent” colors, gradients and shines a’la MSN (even thought the logotype is in the style). Use text based navigation indicators etc. when possible. No over-design. It should be noted that this site is in very wide international use, and should not follow to any particular styles of different countries.

2) maintain the “blank-page” feel of the site. In the redesign the search-element still fits in to the original feel, even though there could be arguments against this. If other search-engines have done that, it doesn´t mean that Google has to do it – maybe a equally funcioning and evident solution more in google-style can be found.

3)I disargree with the notion that the “personal” links at the upper part of the page break the design. A tool-like navigation for logging-in etc. is a quite typical element in web pages, that at least could be thought to become a standard if it already isn’t. Situating it above the main navigation is one typical place. It could be designed better, the content could change, it could be closer to the Google logo etc. etc., but a tool-navigation is not a bad idea.

4) if claim is presented, care should be taken to find something down-to-earth and “personal” that doesn’t water down the straightforward attitude of the brand, a task that would be better left to professionals.

I think the redesign of the page that we saw was hasty, even for an example. It more or less issued the right problems, but through easy solutions with no real thinking in the brand of Goole or the feel of the site. This kind of examples are dangerous when they get too much attention and work towards homogenizing the visual thinking (I’m not talking about usabality) of net-pages even more.

The task of a designer should be finding unique, instinctive solutions to problems, not copying sure-proof solutions from other sites.

I’d be very dissapointed if Google would go towards this approach – even though success can be expected, with this or other similar design.
February 11, 2006
Although I think Google’s site is as good as it needs to be, credit to Andy for giving us an insight. Most designers are too scared/lazy to even bother.
February 11, 2006
Speaking of style:

“Most companies put the cart before the horse.”

“Substance, not style.”

“You are allowed to look like a dog if your product is the cat’s meow.”

“The successful businessperson will always have a hot date to the dinner party.”

“So we should stop swallowing tripe for cream.”

“As designers, it’s time for some of us to see that the emperor has no clothes.”

“We shouldn’t relegate ourselves to simply sailing whichever way the wind is blowing this week. When the wind smells bad, it’s time to get upwind of the bullshit.”

I couldn’t care less about the swearing; it was the clichés and truisms that got to me.
February 11, 2006
I agree with most of what has been said in the article from the design point of view. But if you think about it, Google is highly usable and that is due to the lack of elements around the page. There is another reason for that kind of ugly “simplicity”, which is that they always have to think about bandwitch, especially when you have +20 millions visits. There is page is only 14kb and when you add that up taking all the visits, it comes pretty high. It would be a loss to try and make their page looking better, if for that you have to lose so much bandwitch.
February 12, 2006
Maybe the design isnt great but there are always two elements to ‘web design’, not just the aesthetic. Google is easy to use – anybody who has never used a search engine before knows what to do as soon as they hit the page – as far as Im concerned that’s good design from a usability perspective. Any extra colour, layout or icons would detract from what the service is – a SERVICE. It simply provides a means for users to search. I highly doubt that people would consider their search results more pertinent with a blue background or different buttons.

Ebay and Amazon also do what they do and well. Most people in the world are capable of searching for records or bid items and buying them, and this is mainly because these companies spend thousands on reliable people who monitor the usability of the site.

I’d like to hear your thoughts on the design of some other sites out there which, again serve their purpose, such as Flickr or Kottke.org.

Spread the bullshit like butter, man!
February 12, 2006
This is really sweet stuff, congrats!

By the way, your page doesn’t have valid CSS.

Cheers!
February 13, 2006
Google’s main purpose is a search engine. The site is simple and uncomplicated and directs people dirctly to what they’re looking at. To me this is good design.

The revamped model you showed wasn’t a lot different. There was just the odd link move and color change, but the main purpose and focus of the page (the most important part by far) is exactly the same.

I can see your overall point, but using google was a bad example in my opinion. The article was a little long winded too but sparked debate. Cheers..
February 13, 2006
WHY is it bad design?? You have to give your reader’s examples of what specifically you think is bad design.

Spewing curse words like “suckass”, “shit sandwich” “you suck” and “bullshit” make you sound like you’re 17 years old. Or maybe you are.

Do people pay you for these articulate insights?
February 13, 2006
Are you saying its crap because it isnt pretty or because its not as use-able as it could be? – I think for a medium where the main intention is to efficiently spread information google is just fine, the web isnt supposed to be an art gallery.
February 14, 2006
Is it a matter of design vs. style? Some people really like wood paneling in their homes even though we might agree that large expanses of white walls and clean architectural lines are “good” design. Google appeals to the masses because it’s not pretentious. Some people really don’t like OXO kitchenware—too “fussy” or “elitist” even if it’s more functional and practical. The effect of design is psychological, not just ergonomic. Some of my subjects in usability studies have said they like the Drudge Report (www.drudgereport.com) in terms of its design—hard for me to believe, but I get what they are saying. It’s simple, straightforward, and intelligible to them, perhaps because that’s exactly how they would design the page. So what do we mean by good design and are we just encouraging our biases? I agree that design should be effective, but effective means easy-to-use, not necessarily “pretty”.
February 14, 2006
Thanks Andy for your article. I read it this morning with delight. We often have to fight such argumentation when it comes to the layout of intranet UI and stuff like that. By the way, to me the visual aspect is only one – but very important – aspect of design. The process and execution is also truly important – as you stated, too.
February 14, 2006
heya from germany.

you know I really think you put it down. ok some of your thoughts were a little to harsh, in my opinion but I pretty much agree on you.

well I think we shouldn’t bitch about the ebay design… it was their choise. ok, I really hate their designs and for me as a customer it is always a pain in the ass to go shopping on a page that looks like crap…

BUT it’s not our problem… or is it?
I don’t believe so. just let em do whatever the hell they wanna do.

mfg marty
February 15, 2006
How does the ‘halo effect’ come to play? Research has shown that web users judge sites in the blink of an eye.
Potential readers can make snap decisions in just 50 milliseconds. That is, users were shown a screenshot in just 50 milliseconds, and then they had to rank them.
These results were then compared with the regular ranking of the sites.
http://www.guuui.com/posting.php?id=1730
Andy Rutledge
February 15, 2006
Thanks for your feedback and questions.

Regarding the last few questions/observations that have been posed here, much of what “should” be accomplished is governed by elements of fundamental artistry. These fundamentals are rooted in how humans typically perceive and find meaning in various sorts of lines, forms, colors, compositional arrangements, textures, etc…

What we as designers should begin with is the overall function of the page/interface and then appropriately apply the theme/message/mood that is to be conveyed – all tempered by demographically specific preferences and user habits and the client’s business aims.

Starting with these basics that are relevant to “humans” (fundamentals of artistry), we can then begin to tighten our effort toward those things that are relevant to a particular demographic and apply the relevant design/layout/function characteristics as we tighten the focus – in layers.

In the redesign exercises I did for Google and eBay, many of the style decisions were simply arbitrary – as I am no privy to the mountain of relevant info necessary for making informed stylistic decisions for these companies. However, the layout, design and compositional elements of those exercises were meant to be relevant to those pages. That was the whole purpose of the exercises.

Style was a non-factor – beyond that of entertainment – in what I’m talking about in the exercises and in this particular article. Style is not design and I find it interesting that I’ve been admonished of that fact here. Interesting that style was what most seem compelled to remark on. Not the point. Not even very relevant here.
February 15, 2006
Andy, you’re right. Style is not design. But you seem to be equating the two in this article. For example, you write:

“Boingboing is one of the best-known and most popular weblogs because everybody loves to go there to hate on the Bush administration. The design sucks, but the content and advertising always bashes the readers’ #1 enemy. Substance, not style.”

So, I think you need to clear up a few things for your readers. By ‘design’ do you mean the functionality of the site, the layout of the site, the look and feel of the site, or some sort of combination?

To me, your article appears to focus on look and feel, which is indeed style. Design in the context of the web, refers to so much more than aesthetics; it’s also closely associated with usability. To that end, it’s hard to argue that Google is poorly designed.

As for your use of crude language, I couldn’t give a shit…