Interview - Vincent Flanders of Web Pages That Suck

SitePoint: So how has the Web (and design) changed since you first became involved? What key milestones or turning points have you experienced through your work?

I'm most proud of the fact that I was the first to say Web design was not about art but about money. I took a lot of flak for that back in 1998, but time proved I was right. I'm also proud I said database knowledge would be important.

It might be better to talk about what has changed since the first book 'Web Pages That Suck' was released in April 1998.

SitePoint: OK, sounds logical.

The second biggest positive change is the increase in bandwidth. Unfortunately, not enough people have access to big pipes, so it hasn't let designers take advantage of 500Kb pages loading like 50Kb pages.

But the biggest positive change is the overall improvement in site design, because lots of graphic artists moved from print to the Web. We have a lot of talented people creating sites so the overall quality of Website design has improved.

On the other hand, the second biggest negative change is that CSS didn't become the de facto way to design sites. If you told me back in 1998 that CSS implementation would be as flaky as it is today in 2002, I would have laughed at you. This whole browser/CSS/whatever issue is just stupid beyond all belief.

The biggest negative change is that we've really moved from the world of Web design to the world of software design. The Web is really about software -- the back end. Web designers are becoming, in my opinion, little more than template makers for content manglement (yes, "manglement") systems. The server is the new god and most designers are being pushed down from architect status to housepainter. Software is everything.

SitePoint: The design community tends to have a "love to hate" relationship with usability experts. What reasons do you see for this? Why do designers seem so resistant to the concept and implementation of usability?

A good designer doesn't like usability because a good designer is an artist and you don't become an artist to have other people tell you how to create things in an effective manner. If a person wanted a career like that, he'd become an architect. Don't tune me out -- let me finish the next thought:

The problem with usability is "they're right." When I say, "they're right," I mean that usability studies are based, for the most part, on research -- "64% of users in this test left the site within two clicks if they couldn't figure out the navigation." Usability tests bring in accountability -- and if there's one word artists hate it's "accountability." Art is never accountable. Was Monet accountable? Van Gogh?

That's why you can get away with using Flash, Mystery Meat Navigation, and any other un-usability oriented Web design techniques on music, band, and fashion sites. With most commercial and non-profit sites, there's some way to determine if the site is "working."

There was this huge mofo bank that wanted to win design awards and make money so they put up a Flash site. They won awards, but nobody used their site -- see, they could track the results -- so they switched to a "normal" site. Then, the bank started making money. The goal of a commercial site -- and non-profits are still "commercial" in the sense they're trying to sell you a belief system -- is to make money or disseminate information. And the "best" way to do that is to make sure your site can be used by as many people as possible.

Artists hate research because art isn't about research. It's about expressing one's creative emotions. The Web -- and when I say "Web" I'm talking about the commercial Web -- is the antithesis of art. Art, personal, and experimental sites aren't commercial and have no boundaries.

Designers don't like usability because making a site usable is boring and designers hate being bored -- a fact I can heartily identify with. The truth is, commercial Web design has become really, really boring. The exciting stuff is all experimental -- Flash, music, software design.