Show HN: Interface Lovers – Interviews with designers

ah the good old 2000 and something full of ungoogable flash websites with crazy interfaces. Everything is better now in terms of the relevance of content but at the same time something relevant was certantly lost.

I think it is a bad sign. If people in a field define themself over superficial stuff like that, are they qualified to judge the quality of their work? Or will they also judge them by their superficial standards, how it looks and whether it follows the newest fad? Based on how often redesigns go wrong I fear it is often the latter.

What you can do to innovate is often very limited for a few reasons. You would be amazed how many people dont know what a sandwich menu is, if you vary from the "standard" you lose tons of people right off the bat. Also clients are very scared to try anything new simply because they tend to have a "not broke, dont fix it" mentality.

I do a lot of training type interfaces for large companies and I literally try to compress everything down to a 1 button solution. You put 2 buttons marked start and stop and someone will be befuddled right off the bat. Sounds like exaggeration but its not, If anyone has to click a menu to find something you will lose people because they will wonder where something is at and not click. I try to have everything on screen in an "order" and as little as possible. Anything "extra" and people get distracted etc.

Making UI at this point is like making hammers, try to innovate/design a new hammer.

I agree with much of your statement because I see lots of room for improvement, so wasnt trying to come off argumentative. I simply find its usually not just the designer but also who you are designing for that is the limitation.

"minimalis[m/t]" - 2 mentions in 11 interviews, Billy Sweeney (described as having a "minimalist aesthetic"), Sascha Grief (mentions "preserving the previous version's minimalism")

"Japan" - 1 mention in 11 interviews, Sascha Grief (described as "Living in Osaka, Japan.")

"taste" - 1 mention in 11 interviews, Timothy Achumba ("As designers, taste and preference can only take you so far.")

You said "the questions are almost entirely about their taste". It looks like most of the interviews have the same/similar questions, and very few seem are about taste. I've taken some of the more common ones and grouped them into topics below. It seems to me that only the music question (1 of 24) is about taste. Even a much looser categorization does not seem to support your description of these interviews as "entirely" about taste. I would say the majority of the interview focus on tools, process and the job.

BIOGRAPHICAL (3): What do you do? What led you into design? How do you keep improving yourself as a designer?

TOOLS AND PROCESS (9): What does a typical day look like? Describe your working environment and hardware setup? What apps do you have in your dock? What apps do you have on your iPhone? What’s your design process? What do you use to plan initial design concepts? What apps do you use when designing? Do you have a cool design trick/hack/shortcut? How do you go about testing your design or gathering feedback?

WORK (4): What pieces of work are you most proud of? Where do you go to get inspired? What’s a great website for inspiration? What product have you recently seen that made you think this is great design?

TASTE (1): What music do you listen to when designing?

JOB AND COMPANY (6): Why did you join your company? What’s it like working at your company? What design challenge do you face at your company? How do you handle design disagreements at your company? Is your company currently looking for designers? Any tips on designers getting a job at your company?

ADVICE (1): Any advice for ambitious designers?

In architecture, landscaping, civic design, painting, flower arrangement, music, poetry, etc.—sure, there's a specifically Japanese minimalist aesthetic. But in interface design?

" I am disappointed that the design community has gotten sucked into designing itself more than designing for others"

Designers focus on simplicity for others (their users), not for themselves. Much of Apple's early success comes from focusing on simplicity. Users want simplicity. Designers have to constantly remind themselves to keep it simple, rather than 'innovate' and overcomplicate things for the sake of creating something unique.

Google 'Picasso's bull' - it portrays the evolution of good design and the importance of simplicity.