Google's Lead Visual Designer Quits
And his reasons, I think, are very interesting. Essentially, Google operated for 7 years without a lead designer and made all of their design decisions as engineers with data. So when the lead developer was asked to back decisions up with said data, he balked.
The thing is… I side with Google.
I’m in a unique position being both a designer and a software engineer. I love data, and I appreciate the importance of a visual impact. However, I think designs fail when designers think of themselves too much as artists. Why not test 41 shades of blue and see which works best? Why not determine how thick borders should be? When you have the test-base Google has (billions of users), it’s a cynch.
But I can also understand the desire for a designer to want to make their decisions on instinct and on their eye alone. It’s how they operate and how we all do what we do. After all, aren’t our interactions and reactions with visual design based almost entirely on previous experience? And who made those, but designers operating without data.
I’m not sure if this is as interesting to anyone else, but I find it excited to watch what could be a total sea-change in the way the things we use are built.
