[puppet-master]

Flat design is basically a form of elitism. In order to understand how and why the computer works, you must subscribe to a cathedral of thought that exists at this stage more or less to protect itself and celebrate its own brilliance, because any real invention in the UI space had already basically topped out by the late 90s.

From this perspective, we have flat UI for essentially the same reason we're starting to see the formation of tech unions. It has been a long time since a lot of our industry has done anything new or even productive, and much of what we do is entirely self-serving, creating a kind of fragility that ultimately threatens the workforce. Endless UI churn producing worse and worse designs isn't a problem, it's a symptom that is impossible to ignore.

[noobermin]

While I'm mostly there with you, I feel like it's a bit too strong to call it elitism. It does assume the user has background knowledge and quickness to recognize the difference between an icon, label, and clickable button and some part of these decisions come from some insularity amongst ux designers may be, so it might stem from some out-of-touch-ness but it's probably more unintentional than being elitist.

[systemvoltage]

User Interface expertise was lost way back 20 years ago. There has been a constant onslought by aestheticians and minimalists on the very definition of Design. Design used to be less creative and more objective. It was about addressing the requirements of a product, how best it can serve the user and empathizing with the operator. Now, it means how best to market to the user, brainwash them with glitter of aesthetics, numb them with animations, and tell them to open up the wallet. Make that sale, functionalism be damned.

So here we are. Witnessing complete destruction of the field of Design by commercial optimization and shareholder maximization syndrome. Thrift baby thrift.

[LargoLasskhyfv]

Try https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1372444 the good old Mist from gtk2 resurrected for modern gtk3, and qt4/5 apps take the gtk-style. Problem solved. (For now)

[kevin_thibedeau]

Didn't know XView, Athena widgets, Win3.1, System 6, and more were elitist.

[setpatchaddress]

I don’t necessarily agree with the post you’re responding to, but the intent seems to be to criticize the lack of visual distinctness between elements, not the lack of pseudo-3D-style rendering.

[Gualdrapo]

Windows 3.1 UI was not flat design.

And even things like System6 weren't that _flat_. There were subtleties on their UI that gave a little depth to some stuff. But one could argue the _flat_ in their UI was some sort of answer to the limitations of their time.

[LargoLasskhyfv]

Have you tried

[1] https://www.gnome-look.org/p/1372444 ?

I'm feeling very comfortable with it in GTK2/3 and QT4/5 apps.

Fits perfectly with the built-in theme metal2 from IceWM.

Use this with a filemanager like

[2] https://gitlab.com/antix-contribs/zzzfm

for an optional desktop, and give a shit about what Gnome does.

[nixpulvis]

Elitism... fashion, style, trends...