If I may, I wrote something a few years ago about why flat design is detrimental to user experience. A lot of folks have told me that they've found it helpful in gaining some perspective.
Thanks a lot, a very interesting read. I agree with you, affordance is a problem as different generations use different tools.
There is also a cultural aspect to it. Recently, I had to find icons to represent the concepts numerical minimum and maximum. This was hard, and not just because the space was limited. I settled on Chevrons (like v ^ ) while fully aware it was not standard.
It is just a way of setting a convention, and hoping your users will catch up to it.
That's interesting. I hadn't considering the cultural aspect in the context of icons. It's often a frame of reference when color is being decided, but icons—that's a good one. Thanks for expanding my brain here.
There is also a cultural aspect to it. Recently, I had to find icons to represent the concepts numerical minimum and maximum. This was hard, and not just because the space was limited. I settled on Chevrons (like v ^ ) while fully aware it was not standard.
It is just a way of setting a convention, and hoping your users will catch up to it.