[Fordec]

Of course, there is indeed no shame. There is also no pride.

Standardized interfaces are as exciting as kettle thermal switches or physical knobs in cars. Useful, probably optimal and will be around for decades to come. Also nobody talks about it, treats it with interest, or pays above market rate to work on it.

The value becomes the architecture of the value of the tool, not the interface. There is still value being generated, but the need for a highly paid UX designer evaporates, and is ultimately replaced by the above.

[jrimbault]

> Of course, there is indeed no shame. There is also no pride.

But there's is "pride" in making tools people actually use without issue

[lwhi]

But it's possible to have usability and a unique design character, if you use a human designer.

[whatever1616]

not only possible but sometimes necessary because sometimes you need to sacrifice familiarity and question the assumptions we have to truly make meaningful improvements

[afro88]

If you work with an exceptional one, sure

[Thanemate]

True, but why would people use yet another lookalike tool over the one they're currently using? Or is the implication that looks don't matter as long as it works? Because if that's the case, Why do we need CSS?

[prmph]

the beauty is in the consistency.

why do we build with right angles, straight lines, regular curves, etc? Why not random angles, crooked lines, etc for style and "excitement"?

Why don't we assemble a furniture set from a random assortment of pieces from flea markets? People sense that that is ugly.

[caseyohara]

A better example might be why we build stairs with a standard riser height and tread run. If you've ever accidentally tripped on an unusual or non-standard stair, you already know this.

Users don't need to think about how to use them; they are ubiquitous and familiar, and therefore intuitive and automatic.

If every set of stairs (or, worse, if every stair in a set) was radically different, every time you approached some stairs you would have to think carefully about how to use them so you don't fall.

[prmph]

Your point is true, but the one I was replying to was focusing on the aesthetic aspect. For them, the sameness of UIs, while functional, make for a drab experience.

My point is that I don't find this to be case. Rather, consistent UIs, while functional, are also beautiful to me. The constituents of the UI can be designed with aesthetic taste, but the way it is all put together consistently and functionally has a beauty all its own.

[soraki_soladead]

> There is also no pride.

Is the pride not in solving the users' problems?

> nobody talks about it, treats it with interest, or pays above market rate to work on it.

Definitely needs a citation for this one. For so many products the user isn't paying for standout design. They're paying for insight, leverage, velocity, convenience, whatever. The market definitely supports this by paying above market salaries.

Good design can be a useful differentiator but it isn't the only way for a tool or product to "spark joy" and often _fancy_ design (not good design) is used as a crutch for a subpar product.

[rustystump]

To prove the above person’s point, sap and salesforce have some of the most notoriously bad ux in the market and yes they make bank.

Design is much harder for power user tools compared to consumer. There is far more complexity and the expectation often is users must be trained to even use the tool.

Design only goes so far.

[whatever1616]

> sap and salesforce have some of the most notoriously bad ux in the market and yes they make bank.

Why ? Since its so notoriously bad why have there been no attempts to improve it ?

[dragonwriter]

Because the people making purchasing decisions for SAP and Salesforce are not people who spend any substantial share of their time using it directly or care about the UX.

[rustystump]

There have been but the strength isnt in the ux. Both are effectively enterprise ruby on rails where you can customize and integrate with anything. That is also why they are sticky. They become part of core business pipelines. It is hilarious because the performance is terrible too.

[jimbokun]

Those are the kind of domains where LLMs as an interface should kick ass.

Describe the idea of what you want to do, not the inscrutable steps the application requires to get there.

[nostrademons]

Much of the sadness of the current tech industry comes about because the user's problems were solved in the 90s but now we need to make up new ones to justify the fat salaries, headcount increases, and stock price.

[Fordec]

> They're paying for insight, leverage, velocity, convenience, whatever.

Correct, they are paying for work done by people in other roles, who's title isn't UI or UX designer. It's on the backend person for velocity, it's for business development for leverage, it's on data scientists for insight, it's on logistics for convenience. Those people will be paid for solving those problems, not for tweaking CSS. My team, who falls into this category of more invisible work, has not hired UI or UX person at all. Which by mathematically speaking by default, is simply below the average rate for that work. Meanwhile Apple will pay easily mid six figures for someone in a more flashy role.

[ItsClo688]

the "solving users' problems" framing works for most products but gets complicated for developer tools, where the design is the interaction model. a CLI that gives you typed errors and predictable verbs is design. a confusing API surface that makes you guess is also design, just bad design. the pride question becomes: did you respect the user's mental model?

[the__alchemist]

I don't take pride in having an original UI for most tasks: I take pride in having one that's easy to use and gets the job done. I am not disrespecting people who are making a creative/artistic UI: That adds fun and life to the world. But it's not required for every project.

[pc86]

> There is also no pride.

Respectfully disagree.

You should feel pride when you deliver the easiest-to-use system that the hospital lawyer has ever used. When you get them in and out of the system quickly because it's intuitive and has an appropriate architecture.

[ramakrishna2002]

> You should feel pride when you deliver the easiest-to-use system

If there is no person in the team who prides themselves to deliver interesting/elegant product, then it is very unlikely the product will be interesting/elegant.

I believe this is not something we want to happen, a world with no interesting/elegant products.

[enraged_camel]

>> Of course, there is indeed no shame. There is also no pride.

I disagree completely. The pride should come from the value that is delivered. Specifically, this:

>> Useful, probably optimal and will be around for decades to come.

Is something to be proud of, full stop.

[threatofrain]

I think there's something nice about the idea of a store owner which has unnecessarily decorated the store with love, even with the liability of a cat; it's not delivering the product better and the cat may actually make things worse because of allergies.

A cold American convenience store may be delivering the fundamental value at American prices, but there's something to be said about that "extra" human or creative element. One might say the same thing about the changing nature of the web over time, less individual CSS chaos and more Facebook aesthetics.

[darth_aardvark]

There's nothing stopping people from decorating their boutique stores (or personal blogs, portfolios, and fan websites) the way they want. And that's fun and delightful for me, as a visitor, just like boutique shops are IRL.

But I really don't need that quirkiness at Home Depot, the DMV or my bank (or Amazon, or government websites, or my banking site). I'm there to purchase some screws, register my car or pick up some checks. I just need a storefront (or a website) that lets me do that as fast and homogenously as possible.

99.9% of stores (and UIs) are the latter, not the former.

[jimbokun]

I think many companies need a UX professional to stop developers from deploying bespoke interfaces and forcing them to follow whatever idioms and patterns the users are most familiar with.

[ItsClo688]

agree that fancy ≠ good. some of the most satisfying tools i've used look like they were designed in 1995.