[ChuckNorris89]

I'm also starting to really hate this direction in software design where all buttons are either flat with the UI or hidden through some cryptic menu or swipe gesture or even worse, they're unavailable to the user, all for the sake of simplicity.

If you were to teleport 2003 me into the present, I would have no idea how to use most front ends of today's websites or smartphones.

[Polylactic_acid]

This is not a UI direction, its just a missing feature. Most websites with audio have a volume slider.

[ChuckNorris89]

I wasn't referring to this website specifically but to an industry trend in general of removing basic controls for the sake of simplicity and clean GUIs.