Love of work
In a recent meeting I was asked what I love about the web. My mind went blank. Or, rather, I could only think of what I didn’t like about the web. So, I began with “Hmm,” a pause, and “well, I can tell you what a I hate about the web.”
This consisted of recounting how computers and the internet so often pull me away from other real life pursuits (we can put aside for now the discussion of my self-discipline deficiency). I sit in front of my computer more than an open book; more than on my bike in front of an open road.
So much reliance has been given the social web and mobile devices for instant communication that a hand-written letter — something I think most people would surely cherish — has quite nearly been rendered obsolete. “But,” I continued, “there’s so much to love about the web, too. It can bring people together where it was otherwise not possible.” I hate it and I love it.
In my handful of years involved with the designing and building of websites, I have been learning that love of work, as defined by perpetual, unending joy and curiosity, is not sustainable. We are, however, encouraged and told by the industry and peers that anything otherwise isn’t enough, or actually insufficient for the job. I spend a lot of time reading the latest websites and keeping up with the industry’s latest, but I often grow weary from it. It never stops, and it doesn’t appear that it ever will (which is actually good for the development of the web, a necessity for any industry I suspect).
Obviously, with any line of work, there will be industry changes to be made aware of and keep up with. I do not argue against this. But graphic design on the web has turned much into anything but graphic design. I would not say it is now ‘science’ where it was once ‘art’ because graphic design has always been, in print and on web, a balance of both science and art.
Please don’t mistake me for someone who ‘doesn’t get it’. I understand the web all too well. I understand it’s a completely different medium than its predecessors. I understand that there are completely different sets of technical matter and accessibilities to keep in mind when designing and building.
But that’s not what I’m talking about here. What I’m talking about is that, for all the good the web is said to bring (and has indeed already brought), there are just as many downsides. And right now, and perhaps for a while now, it’s on my mind that web designers at large have been more concerned with getting things ‘right’ according to technical standards rather than making things that are a sheer pleasure to look at and use.
I’ll offer a vague analogy: A window frame can be beautiful, but the purpose of a window frame is to frame a picture of what is beyond it, yonder.
I suppose you could say there are only so many ways to design a book. There are some things you just can’t change. We read left to right, top to bottom. We start at page 1 and continue through the last. And there are definitely similar laws of design on the web. I try to keep this in mind when I see website after website of the same format (my own!), but I can’t help longing for something different. A different focus. A different perspective.
